


I'm Yours

by OverlordAvery



Series: You're Mine [2]
Category: Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency (TV 2016)
Genre: M/M, Other, angst fest
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-11-05
Updated: 2019-11-27
Packaged: 2021-01-23 11:24:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 8
Words: 35,386
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21319417
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OverlordAvery/pseuds/OverlordAvery
Summary: Sequel to "You're Mine"I'm Yours takes place with a brainwashed Dirk Gently ( Forced Svlad Cjelli ) working for Blackwing under Mr. Priest. Their bond slowly growing despite a new monster being put in charge of escorting both of them. Priest and Svlad are now on a case Svlad received through cryptic means, however, it has put them on the path with Project Cerberus. A grouchy Medium who hates his powers and everything to do with it who has two ghosts with him wanting to reach out to Dirk and bring him back to the person he used to be.
Relationships: Dirk Gently & Osmund Priest, Dirk Gently/Osmund Priest
Series: You're Mine [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1536922
Comments: 15
Kudos: 7





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> CHARACTERS: Svlad Cjelli, Osmund Priest, Pete Cook, Theodore and Thomas.  
WARNINGS: Monsteresque themes. Angst. Panic Attack.  
NOTE: Welcome to part two I hope you guys have fun I know I am.

Svlad was excited to be able to go to Montana, he had a good feeling about it as he, Priest, and Pete got everything in order for the trip. Svlad stayed closer to Priest during setting up the travel, noticing Pete seemed more interested in his phone than paying them any attention. Which Svlad decided to take this time to reach up and tug at Priest’s shirt sleeve, watching how the man looked from Pete over to him almost like he knew he wanted to talk about Pete.

“What’s he been doing to you?” He asked softly under his breath, Priest shifted slowing down to put a little more distance between them and Pete. Svlad swore he saw a small cut appearing along the side of his neck, he watched it in slight horror as it grew and extended from the side of his neck to the back of it, a white color beginning to appear in the middle of the growing wound. He looked to Priest when he felt the man put an arm around his shoulder, he glanced back to Pete noticing the cut was gone. He felt unnerved by what was happening, but he wondered if maybe it was a trick of his mind.

Like how when he first met Pete and the man tapped into his abilities, he tried so hard to deny that the man could be anything other than human. But he knew he would never be able to forget that moment, how he could see the small details about him that were off. Limbs a little too long, too many teeth than could fit in his mouth, thousands of cuts through his skin that threatened to open. Pulsing slowly, wrinkles appearing like millions of eyes squeezing themselves closed too tightly. 

All of giving him a feeling of constant surveillance; a monster in a man’s skin.

“Studying me, he hasn’t done anything to get in the way, or odd experiments, just been watching me and taking notes. He seems more interested in the other projects, obviously using me to get to them, but I don’t know what he wants.” He spoke low, and Svlad watched as Pete tilted his head, it was a gentle tilt, a small fraction of movement before he looked to be paying more attention ahead of them, swiping his badge to let them in to where they needed to go.

Svlad couldn’t help but notice security seemed tighter as of late, it made him wonder if something happened. He felt like he was trapped in his room most days, he hated that, but he felt safer there with Pete looming the halls. He really felt like the boogeyman in human form, he didn’t get why a lot of people didn’t seem to get a read on that. He was just glad that Priest didn’t trust him, that meant he was right in his own feelings about him. Even if Pete seemed to be able to play with that too…

“What does Pete want from you?” Svlad looked to Priest from that before looking ahead as they made their way into the back of the helicopter that would take them where they needed to go. Pete had paused to talk with some of the agents who were loading an SUV into the helicopter with them.

“I don’t know. He just… puts me in that white dream, and now I know that I talk aloud during—Oh my gosh… I have said so many bad things about Pete to my friend.” He had to take a moment, running both hands through his hair before he sat down on one of the seats with eyes wide in horror. “I said all of it out loud. Pete knows what I think and feel about him…” Priest was just laughing and Svlad shot him annoyed look as he crossed his arms and pouted up at him. “It’s not funny!”

“Beg to differ.” Priest sounded beyond amused as he sat down next to him. Svlad grunted while looking towards where Pete was. “Don’t think he cares… I shot him in the face, and he acted like it was a minor inconvenience rather than being pissed about it.”

“You… shot him… in the face?” Svlad could feel his jaw go slack from that one as he stared at Priest in mild horror, Priest just arched a brow at him. Arms crossing over his chest while crossing an ankle over his knee. Looking so casual and uncaring about it as he shrugged. “He does not look like someone who has recently taken any sort of gunshot trauma to his face.”

“Yeah… he healed pretty quick.”

“Healed—” Svlad looked to Pete with wide eyes before slowly looking back to Priest, mouth opening before closing as he felt tears threatening to build up in his eyes. “Mr. Priest… do you know something I should know about Pete?” He asked softly.

“Remember how Aodhan said he gets rid of things that don’t belong here?” Priest started under his breath, Svlad hadn’t seen the man trying to be secretive like this before, he followed his eyes to Pete who went from laughing with the agent he was talking to to turning and looking right at both of them. “I think Aodhan needs to kill him. Problem is security around Aodhan is too tight.” Svlad could feel his heart up in his throat as Pete slowly began to smile at them.

It felt like a threat.

“Mr. Priest… he’s not…  _ right _ …”

“He’s from the other side of the red door.” Priest whispered it and Svlad felt like he was going to be sick as Pete finally started to head over to him. He had a large smile on his face as he stopped and put his hands on his hips. Svlad eyed the gun that was visible from the action as his suit jacket opened for them. He slowly moved to hug himself as Pete just stared at them, looking them both over before his eyes locked on him. Svlad couldn’t help but look away, the stare was too intense, his eyes almost looked dead. He swallowed before taking in a deep breath.

“What all do you have for your current case?” He slowly glanced up as the man pulled out his little black notebook.

“Just… fast flashes of scenery, a sign… Thomas’ Holistic Medium Service; you got a name I got their number… the Welcome to Livingston sign.” Pete was jotting it down before moving to sit next to them.

“Don’t let my presence stop your conversation, it was just starting to get good. Would you like to talk in detail how you both plan on getting Aodhan out from behind heavy security locks, guards I have ordered to shoot anyone who isn’t on the okay list, and oh right… away from me?” Svlad hugged himself again, leaning into his seat as he stared out at nothing with wide eyes. Wondering how he was able to listen in on their conversation.

“Pete, we—”

“Shhhh, Svlad, I have eyes and ears on both of you. Maybe if you’re good for the trip I’ll take them off when we land in Montana.” Svlad and Priest both knew he was lying. They were both quiet as they shifted in their spots, Svlad glanced over to Priest who was glaring at Pete in obvious annoyance.

“You put bugs on us?”

“Mhmm, when I first met you both. It’s non-invasive… physically anyway.” He laughed from his own comment and Svlad couldn’t help but wonder how and where this bug was. He slowly got up from his seat and Pete seemed uninterested as he pulled out his phone. Svlad slowly walked to begin pacing, he felt violated knowing that Pete was spying on him and Priest since day one.

“Where? Where is it?”

“Don’t worry your pretty little head, Svlad.” He wondered deep down if that was a hint as he slowly ran his hands through his hair and looked away from Pete again. He just wanted him to go away, could he read thoughts too? He felt so conflicted as he hugged himself and slowly looked to the car they would be spending time in. Stuck in close proximity with Pete… oh god… how was the hotel going to work?

“Pete…” He slowly turned to look at him. “What’s the plan for the hotel?” He asked under his breath, noticing Priest perk up as well, wondering if he also wanted to know then. Pete just smiled while setting his note book back into the inside pocket of his jacket.

“Is there a reason we shouldn’t share a room?” He asked with a low hum in the question. Svlad looked away when he noticed the side of the man’s mustache twitch into a smile. “Unless you two had hotel rooms with one bed for a reason.” He could feel his face heat up from the question, turning his back to the man when his mind jumped to the time, he was high, when he got Priest so worked up that he had to excuse himself to the bathroom. Realizing that Pete was going to find out that there is something more to their relationship than just Subject and Ward.

“No-no, that would be…” He trailed off.

“Easier to keep an eye on someone who tries to run off if they’re close enough to you.” Svlad turned to look to Priest from that, feeling more relaxed that the man pitched in.

“My sentiments exactly.” Pete chimed in and Svlad found himself hating this case and it hadn’t even  _ really _ started yet.

“You already bugged us.”

“Mhmm, and Mr. Priest bugged you, but you two still…” he trailed off, and Svlad slowly reached down to rub the device that was still in his leg. Feeling the sweat on his brow remembering the look of fondness on Pete’s face as he held the remote to it the first time. When he asked him what it did before pushing the button to see if he was telling the truth. There was a look on his face that reminded him of Priest a lot in that moment.

Sadistic Satisfaction.

“Ain’t that just fuckin perfect.” Priest sounded annoyed as he leaned his head back with a look of annoyance.

“You can just act like I’m not even there.”

“Kind of hard to do when you’re the brightest thing the room.” Priest commented getting an amused laugh from Pete.

“If you let Svlad dress himself I’m sure that would change.” Svlad would be lying if he tried to deny liking that idea. He did miss his brighter fashion choices and wardrobe… and he did enjoy Pete’s color schemes, like the pink and yellow he was wearing now. He shoved the thought to the side before slowly returning to Priest’s side and sitting down staring at the floor as he tried to think of what to say to that.

To say the rest of the ride was awkward didn’t cut it. For a while it was silence between them and then Priest finally began making conversation. After a moment of that Svlad got himself comfortable to go to sleep. What he hated was the second he laid his head on Priest’s thigh to sleep he could feel Pete staring at him, making him wonder if he was going to try and put him into that dream again.

After a while he found himself there anyway without the man even touching him. This time the room was like it was before. There was music playing hauntingly from the phonograph, which was still rotting away as he stared at it. Watching the record wave up and down on as the paint visibly began to chip off the speaker, but it seemed to float into the air and dissipate into nothing.

_ “In a whiiiiiiiiiiiite room _ -“ He slowly looked away from it towards the corner where his friend usually was, only this time there was an actual wall visible. It was dingy, dirty, and rotting away, the wallpaper was stained, molded and peeling off the wall. There were rat holes visible from where he stood, he slowly looked to the floor at his feet where he could see garbage and rot. It was slow but a smell slowly started to take over, he gagged as he moved his hand to cover his mouth and nose, eyes watering from the burning sensation of the stench. He stumbled back wondering where he was, why everything looked like this. 

He felt like he was choking on rot.

“With black curtains.” He looked to the voice, seeing a figure sitting on the top of stairs, horribly rotting and decaying stairs. “near the station… I actually hate this song.” The voice finally laughed, Svlad shifted in his spot, keeping his mouth and nose covered. “But he loves it.” He wondered who  _ he _ was as he slowly moved to try and see his friends face. But there was a shadow obscuring them from him.

“Will you ever tell me who you are?” There was silence and he felt like they were slowly looking towards him. But they were still obscured by shadows that just seemed to get darker. “Why did Hugo take me away when I tried to get closer to you?”

“We can’t meet yet. That ruins things… but everything ruins things, always changing warping, twisting. One plan falls apart another enters, dangerous… You know.” He didn’t know… he didn’t like how cryptic they were being, they were normally blunt. “Yes.” Svlad kept his hand covering his mouth and nose, slowly turning to look towards the phonograph when there was no longer music going through it. “He wants me.” He looked back to the stairs seeing the figure was gone, out of sight and out of view. “Pete that is, he’s looking for me and you found me.” The voice was getting more and more distant.

“Wait,” he moved to the stairs, his foot stepped on one and instantly broke through the wood. He slipped catching himself on a stair and he could feel them, rats running along his foot and ankle. Scratching and biting, squealing and squeaking at him for invading their home. He tugged and pulled and tripped, foot coming free as he fell on his ass and looked at the stairs in surprise. “Wait! Come back! Why does he want you? Are you going to leave me?” He felt panic in his chest.

“Debating.”

“Please don’t leave me!” 

“Desperate... maybe I will stay.” He felt like he was crying when he saw the figure in the corner peeking down at him. “Maybe you need me more than I need you. Which makes this  _ interesting _ .” He wasn’t sure what to say to that, he could feel tears pricking at the corner of his eyes. 

“Interesting how? Can you please just talk to me! You said you were my friend!” He shouted, looking to the rats which started to climb out of the hole he put on the stairs. Spitting and hissing at him he slowly backed away from the angry horde that began to form.

“We’ll see.” The voice repeated slowly humming the song as they began to vanish into the darkness.

“Wait!” He looked to the phonograph when he heard it clatter, looking to see the small side table it was sitting on laying on it’s side. The music player destroyed as the record began rolling away. Svlad could see a name written on the record as it rolled and came to a stop, spinning in circles and bouncing before coming to a stop. He waited before slowly getting up, heading over to the record and staring down at it;

“Hugh?”

\---

He awoke with a start from someone shaking him. Looking up at Priest he couldn’t help but notice his face felt wet with tears. He gave a confused noise as he lifted a hand to brush tears away. He didn’t know why he was crying, was it because he was attached to his friend, or maybe because of the smell that had made his eyes water?

“Come on Svlad, it’s time to go.”

Livingston was a small town, not as bad as Illmore was, but pretty small. It was also currently covered in snow which was beautiful to look at, but he suddenly felt very under dressed as he looked to the light dusting of it all over the town. He was thankful Priest thought ahead and handed him a jacket and scarf which he happily put on and cozied up in.

The drive from the helicopter to the hotel was interesting… Pete had different music taste than Priest did. Instead of playing rock country mix it was mainly old school songs. The one currently playing being “Lake Shore Drive” by Aliotte Haynes Jeremiah. Priest looked annoyed and tempted to change the station, Svlad found himself enjoying the lighter pace of the song as he shifted in the back and stared out the window.

When they reached the hotel Pete took charge in talking with the woman behind the counter. He was nice and friendly with her and she seemed to have been charmed by him. The two of them laughing as Priest and himself stayed in more of the lobby area. Pete making them wait because he “didn’t want Priest to scare her” before he headed up. Priest seemed bored as Pete and the woman continued to talk on and on before the man finally pocketed the keys to the hotel and walked over handing one to Priest.

“This way.” Pete mused while turning on his heel, heading down the hallway. Svlad just looked around the hotel they were staying at slowly following Pete and Priest who more or less lead him to and from since they got off the helicopter. He came to a stop and stared at one of the exits and furrowed his brow feeling like he saw something he turned and began to walk after it. He could hear someone trailing behind him and glanced over his shoulder to see Priest, and thankfully it was only Priest. He smiled before looking back ahead while opening the door.

“What’s going on, Svlad?”

“Well I’m trying to figure that out, I feel like I need to go this way so I’m going this way… Plus it’s a nice night for a walk. And away from Pete… Well oh shoot I guess he still has us bugged.” Svlad frowned while rubbing the back of his neck, Priest just sighed from that while walking next to him. The two of them silently enjoying the nice walk through the snow and Svlad inched closer slowly hooking his arm through Priest’s getting a small groan from the man but that was it.

“Any idea where we’re headed?”

“This way gives me a really good feeling.” Into a dark alley out of sight, which he supposed he should expect trouble, Priest obviously did, Svlad could notice the man moving his hand to his hip where his pistol currently was. Svlad smiled from that while glancing around. “It’s pretty here.”

“Uh-huh.” Svlad slowly came to a stop realizing this alleyway actually looked familiar, something was going to happen here. He knew what he was looking for, he stepped closer to a notice board covered in snow, moving a hand to wipe some of the snow away. Looking to the posters that plastered the entire wall;

Missing Abigail Holmes.

“Mr. Priest… I think she’s my case.” He gasped when snow fell on both of them, looking up to the overhanging roof of the building he could see a silhouetted figure above them staring down, Priest moved to grab his gun and the figure jumped off the roof and on top of Priest. It was a quick movement; the gun went off but Svlad could tell it didn’t hit the target as whoever it was ended up in a crouched position on Priest’s chest.

Priest coughing from under the mystery attacker, moving with the gun but with almost lightening speed the attacker slapped a cuff around his wrist and slapped the other side to a slotted railing that was there. And with that Svlad found the attacker looking at him, deep blue eyes locked on his and Svlad could feel the  _ anger _ coming from them as he stood up. It was unspoken and so violent, he stumbled back from the look. Feeling like he was choking on the cloud of anger that radiated off the man who just stared him down like he did something wrong. The mystery man stood a couple inches shorter than himself, and wordlessly he took a step off Priest who was moving to aim the gun at the mystery attacker.

“You.” The word came out as an actual growl and Svlad felt the urge to run... so he did, he could hear the mystery attacker behind him. There was a sense of familiarity to this as he ran blindly down the streets being chased by what he could only assume to be a madman. He could hear a gunshot and then the sound of someone chasing after them, he didn’t even want to spare a glance over his shoulder as he ran as fast as his legs would carry him. He gave a surprised yelp when the man ended up at his right and he quickly turned left down the corner.

It began to feel like a game. The man appearing on either side of him taking him through the streets and down alleyways, it felt like he was herding him. Svlad finally came to a stop. Panting, trying to catch his breath as he turned to look at the man. 

“Wait!” He took in a deep breath head leaning back before he stood up straight and pointed to the man who didn’t even look like he broke a sweat from that run. “Orthrus?” He asked while panting, the man slowly began pacing not saying anything just moving back and forth.

“I have a name, traitor.” He snapped the words and Svlad flinched, hand moving over his chest as he stared at him. He could see that anger in his eyes, the way it burned like a fire, it felt worse than Aodhan’s had when he first met him. Which was saying something because Aodhan actually tried to kill Priest while Orthus just subdued him. 

“Theodore.” He growled and turned around to face Priest moving and standing between them almost protectively. “You sure grew up.” Priest sounded so smug.

“Do not talk to me!” Theodore snapped at him and stepped forwards. “You’re not welcome here.” Theodore spat at his feet while moving closer invading his space as Priest put the gun away. Leaning in and getting back in his face, still having that smug look as he slowly held his hands half up. Svlad could see one side of the cuffs still dangling off his wrist.

“Ohhhh, he and I are a package deal.” Theodore moved and grabbed Priest by the shirt, yanking him down to his height and sneering at him.

“You’re lucky I can’t kill you.”

“Feeling’s mutual.” Svlad rolled his eyes glancing over his shoulder.

“Look can you two just—” He trailed off as he stared at the sign above the small but tall house that read; “Thomas’ Holistic Medium Service…” He moved leaving the two of them in the snow as he opened the door and walked into the house, looking to the younger looking man who stood there with a confused and concerned look on his face.

“Uhmm… I’m closed, dude.” He watched as the man slowly looked next to him with slight annoyance like there was someone talking to him. “Not now.” He shook his head stepping away. “You can come back tomorrow—” He could see Thomas glancing outside and Svlad followed his line of view to see Theodore and Priest outside. He watched as Thomas’ eyes got wide and he stumbled away from the window. Slavd couldn’t help but notice how young Thomas was. He must have only been a child when he scarred Priest. He wondered how he did it, what happened to cause him to do that to Priest when he hardly looked like he could hurt a fly.

“My name’s Svlad Cjelli, I’m a Holistic Detective. I’m not quite sure what my case is other than it probably has something to do with Abigail Holmes disappearance, and you being a medium means—”

“What the fuck is  _ he _ doing here?” Thomas cut him off, Svlad looked from Thomas over to the window towards Priest who was just boredly standing there with his arms crossed over his chest.

“Mr. Priest is my Ward… Don’t worry we’re not here to take you home we just want to solve the case… well okay Mr. Priest will offer for you to come with us but it’s, like,  _ totally _ optional. Blackwing is a lot better now it’s working with the projects, in fact you should see how much better it is now than what it used to be.”

“That man is evil.” Svlad slowly looked to Priest from how Thomas pointed at him, he could see the shaking hands, hear the fear in his voice. He slowly moved to hug himself as his eyes cast downwards towards the floor. He didn’t know how to tell Thomas that they brought something that was truly evil with them, that Priest was nothing compared to the monster that awaited them in the hotel room.

“He’s not so bad… once you get used to him.” He offered up the last part noticing Thomas’ attention flittering to something else before looking back to him with confusion. He even moved to motion something away from him before looking over to him.

“Get out of my shop. Theo!” He yelled towards the door. There was a moment before Theodore backed into the house and shut and locked the door. Looking over to them before looking to the door as Priest walked closer to it.

“Find out what the universe needs from him?” Theo asked and Svlad looked between them.

“What? You have to be fucking kidding me— and you shut up! I don’t have time for you! I’m too busy with that!” He pointed to the side before covering his ears looking.

“Tommy.” Theo growled the name and Thomas looked from Theo to Svlad. Teeth gritting before he crossed his arms.

“You said you were Svlad Cjelli but someone else says your name is Dirk Gently and he has a message for you.” Svlad could feel his eyes burning with tears as he began to back away, shaking his head as his mind viciously told him to leave. He needed to leave, he needed Priest, this was not happening. He wasn’t going to— “He says he’s sorry.”

“No… My name is Svlad Cjelli. Dirk Gently is dead.” Svlad moved and ran his hands through his hair, tears pouring from his eyes instantly as he crouched down and hugged his head to his knees.

“He’s sorry.”

“Don’t.” He begged pathetically and Thomas shifted not even looking at him.

“He wants you to know that he doesn’t blame you. He doesn’t want you to blame yourself either, it’s not your fault.”

“Stop it.” Svlad said under his breath, voice cracking and shaking with sorrow and anguish as he looked up to Thomas from his spot pathetically close to the floor. “Stop, don’t— My name is Svlad Cjelli, and I’m not going… I’m not going to be bad you can’t make me...”

“He-he.” He glanced up looking to Thomas who was staring off at something, he watched as he followed the presence of who he was able to see. And Svlad could picture Todd so perfectly, he sniffled as snot began to pour from his nose as he openly sobbed.

“Don’t.” He flinched back and away from him. “I don’t… I… please don’t do this to me? Please?” He felt sick, he got up stumbling away, looking to Theo who moved out of his way. He fumbled with the door, unlocking it as he slipped out and moved to Priest. Stumbling in to him from the man having been standing on the other side of the door. He grabbed onto his shirt and pressed his face into his chest as he continued to cry. He could feel the man moving a hand to rest it on his back, rubbing it to comfort him, and he felt like he was going to throw up.

“Hey, Svlad, everything’s going to be okay.” He could hear the amusement in the man’s voice that made his heart ache as much as his stomach continued to twist into viscious violent knots. “I’m here for you.” He slowly pulled away from Priest, stepping over to the side hand over his mouth as he stumbled in the snow before coming to a stop. Leaning over and holding his stomach with shaking hands as he began to throw up on the floor outside of Thomas’ house.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Svlad tries to get Tommy and Theo to help him out on the case...  
it's a horrible time for everyone involved.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CHARACTERS: Svlad Cjelli, Osmund Priest, Thomas, Theodore, Pete Cook.  
WARNINGS: Self Harm Mention. Abuse (Mental and physical). Abuse Mention. Murder Mention... just... angst. Priest's POV > Svlad's POV  
NOTE: We're in for a time folks.

Priest glanced over to Svlad, watching him as he retched and gagged in the corner, his eyes slowly moving to Theo who was pacing on the other side of the door. Priest was sure if looks could kill he would be six foot under and Theo would be spitting on his grave. He smiled at the thought before slowly moving towards Svlad, moving a hand and placing it gently on the boy’s back only to be met with a whimper. Svlad actually pulled away, moving from his mess to sit on the ground with his back to him. Holding his head to his knees and rocking while saying; “This isn’t happening.” Over and over like a broken record.

“Svlad.” He said the name to get the boy’s attention, but he just kept rocking and talking to himself. Not even acknowledging him. “Svlad.” Saying the name louder as he crouched down next to him. “We have to work, get up.” Svlad slowly looked at him and there was a look in his eyes he hadn’t seen directed at him in a while.

_Anger_.

There was so much anger and hatred buried deep inside those broken eyes of his. Priest just gave him a smile and he watched the way it faltered. How quickly Svlad went through the five stages of grief in that brief second before his look of acceptance became one of fear.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Priest, I…”

“Tell me what happened.” Svlad just touched his thigh that had Todd’s name, and Priest slowly looked back towards the brothers who were arguing in the doorway. Eyes lingering on Tommy who would randomly yell at something not visible to them. “Oh… I see.” Priest stated while getting up heading over towards the duo who started to look at him, Priest stayed silent as he watched Thomas back away from him with a look of fear in his eyes. Theo moved and stood in front of him blocking him from going any further into the house other than passed the threshold of the doorway.

“You’re not welcome here.” Theodore spoke under his breath and Priest just smiled patiently at him.

“I need to talk to Thomas, stand down.” Waiting for him to bend and follow his order like a good little boy.

“You can’t control me anymore.” Theodore stood his ground, but Priest could see the lingering fear buried deep in those angry eyes. He leaned in and smiled at him, his eyes scanned Theodore’s carefully looking for what he wanted to make him back down. “And you can’t hurt Tommy anymore.”

“Thomas has always hurt himself, Theo. You know how he gets, always wanted to make them shut up, trying to find ways to make the voices stop—”

“Stop it!”

“Now, you know how I operate.” He stated watching Theo glare up at him. “You know exactly how I work, you used to like it, I gave you order in a world of chaos and the unknown. I gave you something to ground yourself too, and you thanked me for it.” He watched Theo begin to grind his teeth.

“You used me.” He was shaking with anger and fury that just had Priest smiling as he stepped closer, getting in his face.

“I won’t tell you again, Theo. Stand. Down.” There was a pause and he could see Theodore shaking at first, he thought it was with fear, that he would back down. Instead he shouted in rage and swung a fist at him. Priest dodged, ducking under the fist and moving to the side while bringing his own arm out clothes lining him as he walked by. “You know we just need you alive and not necessarily in one piece. Maybe I’ll break those legs of yours, can’t go runnin’ anymore if I go an’ do that.” He stated as he continued right towards Thomas who had shut himself in another room.

“Shut up! Shut up! Stop talking! Go away!” He could hear the boy talking to himself and Priest stood on the other end of the door. Lifting a hand and knocking patiently as he waited for Thomas to open the door.

“Tommy, I’m going to need you to escort Mr. Brotzman, and Miss Black out of the land of the living.”

“They don’t want to pass!” He could hear Thomas answer in a muffled voice behind the door.

“So… Make. Them.” Priest snapped the words at him.

“No. Even if they wanted to I wouldn’t you should see them they…” He could hear him trail off and Priest grinned from that while pressing his forehead against the door.

“Yeah… I made sure they suffered before they died.” Priest stated with a giggle as he moved and grabbed the door handle, turning it and beginning to open the door only for Theodore to jump on his back.

“Leave him alone!” Theodore yelled in his ear, Priest grunted stepping back as Theodore held him rather tightly in the sleeper hold. He moved and slammed the boy hard into the wall listening to him grunt about to do it again when he heard a whistle, both of them turning to look to the doorway to see Pete. The man ducking to step into the small house, hands on his hips as he looked to them and around the small home with a look of boredom. Priest could feel Theodore’s grip loosen and Priest threw him off on to the floor. He lifted his foot and stepped on Theodore’s chest, leaning on his leg as he stared down at him.

“I told you to stand down, boy.” He slowly raised his eyes to look at Pete when he noticed Theodore staring at him with uncertainty. “We got this handled, Pete.” Priest stated in annoyance watching as Pete just tilted his head, pursing his lips before motioning towards Svlad who was still out in the snow having a break down.

“Really? Cause to me it looks like a shit show in here.” Pete stated bluntly causing Priest to narrow his eyes on him. Really this was nothing compared to what it could be.

“What… is that?” Theodore asked from his spot on the floor finally moving to try and shove Priest’s foot off him.

“Oh, forgive me, my name is Peter Cook, please call me Pete. I’m an Agent from Blackwing here to assist Svlad Cjelli and Osmund Priest on their case. For the most part you won’t even know I’m here, but this seemed like something that required an intervention…” The man shrugged while pulling out that little black notebook of his. “You must be Theodore, right? It’s a pleasure to meet you.” Priest slowly lifted his foot off Theodore and let him get up, watching him brush himself off, readjusting his shirt before heading over to Pete.

“You are one of those things.” He sounded accusatory and Priest watched as Pete just smiled. “Chased one of you to a person like me before, watched him turn them into fireworks.” That meant Theodore knew Aodhan. “You’re not welcome here.” Priest could see the small twitch of Pete’s fingers as the man just continued to smile, acting like it was nothing. Like he wasn’t affected by the words, but Priest knew from that movement Pete was pissed. “And he’s not welcome here.” Theo pointed at him and Priest just smirked while crossing his arms over his chest.

“Mhmm, but Svlad has a case that has led him here.”

“Only that kid outside in the snow can come in.” Priest couldn’t help but notice his attitude towards Svlad had changed, from being angry and calling him a traitor, to now seeing him as just some kid. Pity how quickly that changed from one little break down it would have been a fun thing to use. “Why don’t you both get out of my house and let him come in?”

“Not until Thomas gets rid of Todd and Farah.” Priest stated while looking to the door where he could see Thomas peeking out from. The second they made eye contact he watched his eyes widen in fear before he slammed the door.

“Thomas told you they don’t want to pass.” Theodore snapped back at him.

“Mr. Priest.” Priest slowly looked to Pete from the man speaking to him. Watching him as he sauntered on in to the house, putting his notebook away before grabbing him by the bicep. Pulling him away from the door while pushing him towards the exit. “Why don’t we talk outside. Let Svlad and the boy’s talk. Or are you afraid that you don’t have as strong of a grasp on Svlad as you once thought you did?” Pete asked that in a whisper which had Priest glaring at him. Hating how he was calling his work into question, but they stepped outside, and Priest could see Svlad still sitting there playing in the snow.

“Hey, Svlad.” He sighed and walked over to him, crouching down next to him again while putting a hand on his back. The boy slowly looked up to him with a look of numbness on his face, no longer crying, just looking sad and broken, but also tired and uncaring. “You need to go in there, to talk about your case, remember?” He asked getting a small noise from Svlad who moved to rub his thighs. “What’s your name?” He asked watching as Svlad looked up to him.

“Svlad Cjelli.” He said it easily, eyes looking between his and Priest stood up and held a hand out to him. Svlad’s hand was freezing when he took it and Priest helped him up, pulling him into a hug and giving him a kiss on the forehead. “I’m Svlad Cjelli… I… I’ll be good I promise.” He enjoyed how the boy clung on to him, so desperate to please and not be bad.

“Abigail was the missing girls name?” He asked and Svlad nodded while sniffling, stepping back to wipe the tears off his face. “Just talk about her.” Priest watched him nod as he turned to look back towards the house. “You got this.” He watched him nod more before taking in a deep breath and slowly letting it out, Priest watched him head for the home and Theodore step outside. Letting Svlad in while closing the door behind him, guarding the door while glaring at both of them.

“Theodore.” Priest slowly looked over to Pete as the man pulled his notebook out again, looking things over. “Come here for a moment.” He smiled, and Priest could feel a chill running up his spine from it, because it looked wrong, it was too wide of a smile to be normal. His eyes from Pete to Theo who just sneered at him and began pacing.

“No.”

“Pretty please?” Pete asked and Priest just rolled his eyes while crossing his arms over his chest, wondering if Pete was seriously going to see what he did to him. Though he had to admit he was curious how exactly he was going to trigger Theo’s abilities.

“Fuck you.” Theodore finally snapped and Pete just laughed before slowly heading over towards him.

“Then I guess I’ll come to you.”

\---

“I don’t want to talk about them.” Svlad said immediately as he grabbed out the crumpled missing persons poster he had grabbed while running from Theodore. “I just want to talk about Abigail Holmes.” He opened the poster and held it out for Thomas to see, watching him look from him to the poster giving a sigh as he walked over and took it. Svlad could notice the look of familiarity in his eyes making him wonder if he knows her from the town being small. Probably seen her posters around though…

“I was contacted in a dream to come here, to come to you, and from your brother chasing me here it’s only safe to assume the universe wants me here. I wasn’t sure for what at first but then this kind of just presented itself to me, and I have _totally_ solved a missing persons case before, it was for a girl named Lydia, totally solved that one. It was great.” He was nervously looking around as he spoke, Thomas was looking the poster over intently while waving his hand at the air next to him.

“Yeah, I… I saw this girl for the first time the other night.” Svlad watched as he slowly looked off into the corner. “I don’t think she’s dead, she looks different than other ghosts. She’s far away from me trying hard to talk but I can’t hear her. She’s currently right there by that chair.” He pointed and Svlad turned his head to look towards where he was pointing. “It’s… weird… I have tried to get close to her, but she just stays the same distance from me. She used to try to be running towards me but recently she’s just sitting on the ground crying.” He shrugged his shoulders.

“Oh… well, that isn’t helpful… Wait! Do you think she could lead you somewhere? I mean she had to find you somehow, people like know how to get back to where their bodies are, right?” Svlad asked while looking back to him, Thomas shuddered from the question.

“Look, you got a whole lot of baggage happening with you.” Svlad slowly looked back as Thomas motioned next to him. “Not to mention evil incarnate times two.” He pointed towards the door where Pete and Priest currently were. “I know Priest, but I have no idea what the fuck that other thing in my house was and I definitely don’t want it back in here.” Svlad moved to rub the back of his neck.

“What… what’s he look like to you?” Thomas shuddered while staring at him.

“What does he look like to you?” Thomas countered.

“A person—”

“That _thing_ is not a person, the kid hanging around next to it sure.” He shrugged and Svlad looked surprised before looking towards where Pete was. “But that thing is a monster, you really can’t see it?” Thomas asked, but Svlad found himself caught off guard by Thomas saying there was a kid next to Pete.

“Kid?”

“His baggage, or something. Dunno, kid seemed pleased as punch runnin around next to it, probably don’t know he’s dead. Sometimes that happens. Anyway! I got off track!” Thomas clapped his hands together and pointed at him with them. “Back to my point, you have too much baggage, I don’t want it. I don’t want to hear about it, I don’t want to see it. I don’t _care_. I also don’t care about what the universe wants it can all fucking explode for all I care, take me with it and give me some peace and fucking quiet.”

“But the case—” 

“You know what I _really _want? I want to sit down, enjoy catching up with my Brother who keeps eating all my cereal and judging my choice of beverages. I want to actually be able to enjoy the company of another living human being who understands me and will help distract me from the horror show that is in my home. I want to enjoy some peace and quiet, ignoring all of this.” Motioning around to what Svlad could only assume were the ghosts the man spoke with. “I don’t want to do this.” Motioning between them. “I don’t want to solve some case. You know why?”

“No…”

“If I help one ghost in a different way then suddenly they all want that. And I don’t have the patience, time, money, or desire to help these people.” He stated with a scoff.

“You said she looks different, maybe she’s not a ghost.” Svlad pointed out, getting a heavy eye roll from Thomas.

“And even if for some reason I did want to help you there is a bigger problem in the scenario I have not even touched upon.” Svlad watched as Thomas looked towards the door before looking back to him. “I am _not_ working with Mr. Priest. I can’t do that; don’t you _dare_ ask me to do that. It’s not _fair_ and it’s not _okay._ You _know_ what he’s like.” He said it under his breath and Svlad could feel tears threatening to come out again.

“You just have to get used to him—”

“No!” Thomas snapped the word while taking a step closer to him. “I will _never_ get used to that man! You have some sort of fucking audacity to ask that of me! I will _never_ speak with or work for him! You cannot just come barging into my life with my abuser in toe and ask _shit_ from me! We’re done, this conversation is over, take your baggage and leave!” He pointed to either side of him and Svlad moved a hand to his chest realizing they were both there. Todd and Farah were both there, he took in a shaky breath and slowly began to back out and away from Thomas. Out the door only to find Pete writing something down. Priest looking mildly entertained, and Theodore nowhere to be found.

“Where…” He cleared his throat and both of them looked at him. “Where’s Theo?” Svlad finally asked, watching as Pete closed his book and tucked it into his pocket.

“He went for a run.” Pete stated casually while smiling at him. “Did you get what you needed?” Svlad looked over his shoulder towards the door which had slammed shut behind him.

“He doesn’t want to help, but I don’t think Abigail is dead, he said she looked different and couldn’t contact him.” Pete was laughing at that while moving towards the door.

“See, this is why you two need me.” He stepped away from Pete watching as he opened the door and walked into the building. Shutting the door behind him, he could hear Thomas from there asking Pete to go away and leave him alone. He listened in silent horror as the demands turned into begging, eyes shifting over when he caught movement of someone rushing over to them seeing Theodore who barged into the house.

Svlad moved to cover his head when he heard a scream, crouching as he buried his face into his knees, tears streaming down his face as he stared at the snow below him. He could feel body heat next to him and glanced over his shoulder to look at Priest, disappointed that that’s what he saw and hating himself for thinking he would see any different. He moved and hugged himself, silently waiting for whatever Pete was doing to be over.

“Thomas said there is a boy that’s next to Pete.” He looked back up at him while wiping the tears from his face. “He said he doesn’t think the boy knows he’s dead.” He couldn’t help but find himself curious about that, made him wonder if maybe it was one of Pete’s kids. He knew he was married so it was safe to assume they had kids… could a monster even have children?

“Oh really?” He watched the way Priest just smiled from this information. Like it was something he planned on using. Svlad watched him from where he stood before looking back towards the house when he saw Pete walk out dragging Theodore behind him throwing him to the ground at Priest’s feet.

“We’re taking this with us until Tommy decides to play nice.” Theodore groaned and worked on slowly standing up on shaky legs. He looked injured, holding his bruising throat while turning to glare at Pete.

“Fuck you, Tommy doesn’t owe any of you shit!” Svlad flinched when Pete grabbed Theodore by the face and pulled him close a large smile on his face and a gleam in his eyes behind his glasses that gave Svlad the creeps.

“Theo. You’re being unpleasant.” Svlad could see Theo’s eye twitching from the comment in anger before the man pulled away and spit in his face. Svlad could see the amused grin pulling across Priest’s face from that as Pete stood up straight with a heavy sigh, hitting Theodore across the face. It was a hard hit, Svlad flinched from the sound as he watched Theo hit the ground so hard, he practically bounced. Pete pulled the handkerchief from his breast pocket and wiped the spit off his face before tucking it away. “Mr. Priest, why don’t you carry that for me.” Pete stated while walking away.

“Wait! Wait!” Thomas ran out of the house, sliding to a stop in front of Pete with tears in his eyes. “I’ll do it! I’ll help, please don’t take him!?” Begging as he stared at Pete with fear, tears in his eyes and Svlad couldn’t help but notice he looked roughed up as well. “I’ll do it… I’ll do it… Please?” Svlad felt like he was going to cry watching Tommy cry, watching him look between all of them not sure what to do in this situation. “Please don’t take him away from me?”

“I get the feeling we’ll need something as collateral, Tommy. You’re not exactly a team player. And Theo? Well he’s a little hellion who doesn’t play well with others.”

“I could say the same about you.” Thomas managed to mutter under his breath.

“I play wonderfully with others, isn’t that right boys?” Pete glanced back at them and Priest was rolling his eyes as Svlad just hugged himself and looked away. Not wanting to watch this as he knelt down next to Theo, checking on him to make sure he was okay. He was breathing well, he could see a cut on Theo’s cheek from Pete’s wedding ring. And he was out cold. Snow slowly starting to dust over him. He sniffled from the cold before moving to nudge Priest.

“Can we get him off the floor, it’s cold.” Priest leaned down about to help Svlad but Thomas was over to them shoving Priest away… well trying, Priest barely moved as Thomas’s feet slid in the snow as he tried to walk forwards. Hands flat on Priest’s shoulder as he tried with all his might to push him away.

“Don’t touch him! Don’t you dare touch him!” Priest moved and grabbed Thomas by the arm, standing up straight and smiling as he looked down at him.

“Relax, Tommy, just going to help him out.” He mused out with a large smile.

“Don’t you dare touch him.” He was shaking as he said those words to him, Svlad felt familiar with it, scared but protective.

“Absolute shit show.” Svlad looked from Thomas and Priest with tears in his eyes before glancing back over to Pete who just walked over and picked Theodore up like it was nothing. Throwing him over his shoulder while walking down the street, Thomas quickly ran after him.

“Put him down! Get your gross hands off him!” Svlad hesitated as he stood up, looking from them over to Priest as they slowly began to follow him to where the SUV was parked not far from them. Svlad watched as Pete carelessly opened the back door and threw Theodore inside, turning to look at Thomas as he shut the door. Turning to motion them over, Svlad headed over, still hugging himself as he came to a stop next to Pete and Thomas. Priest staying at his side as he looked them over.

“Now that you’re playing along, Svlad, find out where we need to go.” The man stated while climbing in the driver’s seat. Working on heating the car up for them before they go on their trip. Thomas was looking at the car before turning to look back at them, pressing his back into the SUV as he looked up at Priest obviously not wanting to turn his back to him.

“Please, just let me have Theo, I can’t talk to her I don’t know how to help you. I can point you in the direction of her parents but she—” He glanced over and Svlad could see the confusion on his face as he stepped away and looked around. Peeking on the other side of the SUV before looking back towards his house. “Huh… She’s gone…” He slowly started to head towards his house and Svlad and Priest both followed after him as he began to search the rooms of his home. “Hey Svlad… she’s gone.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tommy reluctantly decides to help Svlad with his case.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CHARACTERS: Svlad Cjelli, Osmund Priest, Thomas, Farah Black, Pete Cook, Theodore.  
WARNINGS: Angst. Panic Attack. Depression with suicidal thought processing. Mentions of Abuse. Kidnapping. Svlad's POV.   
NOTE: Welp. -shrug emoji-

That wasn’t good.

Svlad stared at the house before looking over towards Pete who seemed rather impatient in the SUV. Not knowing what to do in that situation, Priest was walking over and Pete rolled down the window to talk to him, with that Svlad took in a deep breath and walked deeper into the house he could see Thomas pacing, hands in his hair tears in his eyes as he looked down at him from the top of the stairs.

“He’s going to take Theo away isn’t he?” Tommy asked in a soft voice, Svlad looked over his shoulder where he could see the SUV driving away and only Priest was left in the snow.

“I’m sorry, Tommy.” The man was fast in running down the stairs grabbing him by the front of the shirt while leaning in.

“This is your fault! I don’t want any part of this!” He shouted and Svlad could feel his own tears building in his eyes as he watched him. “Make them give him back!” Shaking him, Svlad could see the desperation on his face and the heartbreak. “Make them give him back to me, he’s a good person, he doesn’t deserve to go back there! He’s way better than I am! He does what he’s supposed to do, please!?” Svlad sniffled while looking away.

“It’s not up to me…” Tommy shoved him and Svlad looked back at him, a hand slowly reaching out. “I’m sorry—”

“No, you’re not.” He turned to the side and gave a pointed finger at the air. “And you shut up! He is ruining my brother’s life! He is worse than them! I don’t give a shit about his sob story! Or if he doesn’t want to do this or not he still is actively participating in this!” Svlad had been through a lot of pain in his life, especially recently, but that hurt more than he was expecting. He could feel the tears slipping from his eyes as he looked from Tommy towards the door where Priest now stood. He didn’t know what to do now, he took in a deep breath and slowly let it out. He wanted to leave, but he couldn’t. They needed to do this case, but he would rather just curl up in bed and never leave it.

“So, she’s gone, huh?” Tommy was glaring at Priest as the man just coldly crossed his arms over his chest. “Means she’s not dead.” Priest stated and Svlad supposed that was a silver lining in this bullshit, maybe she was in the process of dying though? He didn’t know how that all worked, or what all to say, Priest thankfully did. “Believe you were starting to mention directing us to her parents?” Priest asked with an amused grin, Thomas grit his teeth and slowly looked to him.

“Yeah… her mom’s been here hoping I could find her.” He was shaking in anger. “I told her I was a medium not psychic. That’s not my job I only talk to people when they’re already dead. The fact I hadn’t seen her was enough for her to push harder on the police, why don’t you go talk to them and let Theo go.” Svlad watched Priest run his tongue over his bottom teeth before stepping forwards.

“See, now this seems like something you should come with us for. You already have more information than we have.” Thomas just pointed at Svlad and he wished he could disappear at this moment in time. That he could sink into the floor and become invisible. He hated everything about this and just wished the case was over, he wanted to sleep and find out if his new friend was still there or not.

“He is the detective, he said so himself, he can solve his own fucking case! I’m not a goddamn babysitter!”

“No? But you try so hard to watch out for your big brother.” Priest had a type of calmness about him that was eating Svlad up from the inside. Because here he was struggling, scared, in pain both mental and physical to the point his bones ached from the stress of this situation. But Priest was just talking about all this like he was ordering a glass of water.

“Stop it—”

“Worried he’ll come back to us.” Priest smiled and Svlad slowly hugged himself as Thomas was tearing up.

“You have no hold over him anymore.” His voice was trembling with anger and outrage. And Svlad was curious to know what they were talking about but at the same time he didn’t want to hear it. He learned recently ignorance was bliss.

“That’s okay, Tommy, Theo will just have to help in your stead. I’m sure he’ll enjoy the familiarity... Svlad, come on.” Svlad was quick to go to his side, walking out of the house and following after him. He could hear the door slam and keys rattling, looking over his shoulder he watched as Tommy locked his door and stuff the keys in his pocket. Zipping up his grey leather jacket and stuffing his hands deep in the pockets as he pouted and walked passed them.

“The Holmes residency is this way.” Thomas stated and Svlad watched him feeling his anger and sorrow as he and Priest followed him. The walk was surprisingly peaceful, Thomas didn’t talk to them and neither he or Priest said anything. Just walked through the snow, taking what Svlad felt was an interesting route though the more he paid attention the more he realized they were walking around a cemetery. He looked from it over to Thomas who was bundling up more in his coat doing everything in his power to stare at the floor rather than looking up.

That he seemed to be doing his best to ignore whatever was next to them as he and Priest had the realization it would be faster to go through the cemetery. But they eventually reached a nice-looking house, small picket fence, looked like something out of a magazine. Svlad realized it might be a problem given the time, but he supposed a parent looking for their child wouldn’t care when they get disturbed by someone trying to find their child.

“The Holmes residence.” Thomas stated and Svlad walked forwards over to the door, lifting a hand and knocking on it he waited patiently. Rubbing his hands together in an attempt to get some warmth back into his fingers. After a moment he lifted his hand about to knock again only for the door to open. A middle-aged woman stood on the other side of the door, dressed in a robe as she looked from him back towards Thomas and Priest. Her eyes locked on Thomas and tears instantly began to fill her eyes.

“No, please don’t tell me she’s dead—”

“No, no we don’t think so at all Miss… Missus? Holmes, I’m Svlad Cjelli a Holistic Detective. I was given your daughters case. Thomas was just kind enough to show me to your residence.” He informed, not wanting her to worry, the woman slowly nodded.

“Please, call me Shiloh, and come in, come in.” She moved to open the door for them motioning them all into her home. Svlad happily stepped in enjoying the warmth he was met with, a smile on his face as he listened to Priest and Thomas come in as well. They made sure to wipe as much snow off their shoes as possible, Shiloh even laid out a few towels to catch more of it as they walked in. She had them sit down and offered coffee or tea.

“Oh, tea would be lovely.” Svlad hummed out, Priest of course wanted Coffee and Tommy said he was fine as he sat as far away from them as possible. Shiloh walked into the kitchen which was visible from where they were, setting up the coffee pot and then a kettle for the tea she came back and sat down with them.

“What do you need to know, Mr. Cjelli?” She asked while fussing with the tie for her robe. Nervous, anxious, even a little bit excited to have someone else working on her daughter’s case.

“Anything at all would be really helpful, even the smallest details, is her room still the same as it was before she left?” She was nodding.

“Well it all had been odd, she was at school when she went missing. But for a while she still texted me, she told me not to worry and she was fine. We couldn’t quite pin down where the messages were coming from, the gps on her phone was giving weird readings, even her messages… well here let me show you.” She reached in her pocket and pulled out her phone walking over to him and showing him previous texts with her daughter. The messages looked like they were glitching. The font was weird and broken but seemed somewhat readable and they did all have the same theme to them.

“But then she stopped responding all together. And I waited and waited and got a voice message.” She took the phone and went to the voicemail. Putting it on speaker Svlad could feel a chill running up his spine from the whining music, eyes widening as it hauntingly played out of the phone with the sound of labored breathing.

_“In a whiiiiiiiiiiiite rooooom_.” He felt like the room was spinning as he stood up, eyes wide as music became more and more distorted. “_With black curtains, near the station_.” Someone was singing along with it, their voice even more distorted and the breathing got heavier and more panicked. “_You’re not having fun anymore.._.” The message cut off there from the distorted voice’s comment which still came out in the tune of the song. But he didn’t recognize it, it wasn’t his friend.

“Excuse me, where is your bathroom.” It all felt like white noise as she spoke, he didn’t understand anything she was saying but he saw where she was pointing and slowly headed that way. Looking to the doors he passed and stopping when he caught a mirror and a toilet in one. He slipped in and shut and locked the door stopping in front of the toilet as he gagged and retched.

Wondering if this was going to be the new thing, if he would be thrown so hard and violently into a panic attack that he was going to throw up every time one occurred. He felt exhausted from not having anything to throw up, he could hear the kettle whistling and sat on the floor pressing his back against the bathtub as he held his head in his hands.

“Svlad.” He heard a knock on the door and slowly looked up, feeling tears in his eyes.

“I’m coming.” He flushed the toilet despite not actually having been able to throw up. He moved and washed his hands, trying to calm down, splashing some water on his face before burying it into the towel to dry off his hands. After a moment he stepped over to the door and opened it. “I know that song, _that_ version of that song. Mr. Priest. It’s been in my dream since the first meeting with my friend.” He said it under his breath, Priest looked interested as he glanced back towards where he left Tommy and Shiloh.

“You think your friend has our girl?” He shook his head from that.

“No, no the voice that was singing along was different, a _lot_ different. I don’t know who it could be.” He stated while stepping out of the bathroom while Priest followed after him. “Sorry about that, do you mind if I look for clues in your daughter’s room?” He asked with a forced smile, she nodded and lead the three of them down the hall, stopping at a door that was closed she took in a shaky breath and slowly opened it. “We will try not to disturb anything.” Svlad promised as they walked in, Svlad looked around trying to decide if there was anything that grabbed his attention, but honestly the only thing that did was the bed.

He stared at it for a long time before walking over and kneeling down next to it. Priest just watched him as Svlad checked under the pillows first, then in the pillow cases, when he came up empty handed, he looked between the mattress and box spring. He stared at it for a while, at the photo that was under there, reaching over to grab it he sat back down on his calves. In the picture was Abigail, someone was next to her, but they were horribly blurred and distorted, almost like the messages that had come through to Shiloh’s phone.

“Shiloh.” The woman walked over and looked at the photo with slight surprise given Abigail looked to be kissing whoever was in the photo with her. “Did Abigail have a love interest?”

“Not that she mentioned to me.” Shiloh sounded shocked and hurt, he watched her take the photo and sit down on the foot of the bed. Staring at it with tears in her eyes while touching her daughter’s cheek in the photo. “Why would she hide this? That’s not like Abigail…”

“Has she been acting strange recently? Maybe isolating herself? Nervous, anxious, odd changes in behavior?” Priest finally asked and Shiloh shook her head.

“No, she’s been a lot happier recently, she’s been hanging out with he friends and going out after school a lot. You don’t think… whoever this is could have hurt Abigail, do you?” Svlad looked from her to Priest while hugging himself, trying to think of the voice on the phone. It didn’t sound angry, or disappointed, even accusatory when it made the statement. Honestly the voice just sounded concerned…

“No… they sound concerned.” He pointed out while looking towards Tommy who he could see in was in the middle of arguing by whispering to whoever was standing to the right of him. He eventually gave a heavy sigh and leaned his head back and eyes closed. It was much in the fashion one would have when they were exasperated by whatever was going on.

“Farah wants to know if she has a close friend, we could speak to who might know about this mystery person.” Svlad couldn’t stop a smile that crossed his face from that, it was nice to imagine her getting into the case, wanting to help. Asking questions that he wouldn’t think of that would help with the investigation. But he also felt his heart breaking, hand moving to his chest as he looked away while Shiloh nodded. He could feel tears in his eyes as Priest put a hand on his shoulder. The feeling made him even more tired.

“Oh yes, Emery, she’s a good girl, she and Abigail go way back. She might know who it is, she’s always been the kind of person to cover up for Abby when she gets rowdy…” She gave a soft laugh while jotting an address down for them. “I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s doing that now.” She sounded sad and Priest moved to take the photo from her.

“We’ll get this back to you… Come on Svlad, Tommy, thank you for your time Shiloh.” She nodded her head and they walked out of the house. There was a long pause when they got outside, and could see the SUV waiting for them, the window rolled down with Pete just reading a book waiting patiently. Priest lead the way after putting a hand on the back of Tommy’s neck, leading him to the car and getting him into the back seat. Svlad watched as Priest cuffed him and put the door on child lock so Tommy couldn’t escape.

“Get in the car, Svlad.” He waited for a moment before heading over, climbing in on the other side, shutting the door and putting on his seatbelt while Priest got into the passenger’s side. Svlad looked into the back where he could see Theo on the floor of the hatch tied up and gagged. But curled in a ball seemingly glaring at the back of the seat. When he glanced over, he could see Tommy glaring daggers at him which had him pressing himself more against the door.

“Your friends are annoyingly persistent.” Svlad looked away and curled up, hugging his legs to his chest as he stared out the window.

“They’re dead. Just like Dirk’s dead, please stop bringing them up. They’re Dirk’s friends not my friends.” He said it softly, he could see the smile on Priest’s face through the side mirror. The smile gave him butterflies because that meant he was being good. And through the whole rollercoaster of emotions he has felt since his dream with his friend trying to leave him, he needed that. He needed to feel like he was doing something right.

“They really fucked you up, didn’t they?” Svlad was silent before looking over to him while sniffling. Forcing a smile as he sat up straight.

“No, Mr. Priest has helped me use my abilities to their full potential, which is why I knew where the photo was.” He pointed out while looking back out the window. “I’m perfectly fine.” He said that mainly for himself as he looked to the buildings they passed till they pulled into the hotel. Pete put it in Park while looking over to Priest.

“I’ll get Theo, why don’t you bring Tommy in?” He turned off the car and got out. Svlad found himself hating the position he was in as he got out and watched Pete drag Theodore out of the car. Carrying him over his shoulder as Priest dragged Tommy out and dragged him by his arm. He slowly followed after, feeling like an accomplice and hating every second of it as they got to their room. Pete throwing Theodore down on the couch in the mock living space as Priest shoved Tommy down next to him.

Tommy was taking off Theo’s gag and hugging him, apologizing for getting him dragged into this, and his heart ached for them as he looked away. Wishing it was over as he headed to the beds, looking between each of them he could see where Pete had set up his own and he flopped down on the other. Moving to get undressed so he was in his tank top and boxers as he slipped under the covers. Just enjoying the sweet embrace of sleep.

Svlad was thankful to find himself in that place with the phonograph again. He was sitting at a table this time just looking around the room trying to pick up more detail, trying to find anything he could to try and figure out where this place was located. “Hey… are you here?” He asked after a moment, looking over his shoulder towards the stairs. “Do you know who had Abigail?”

“I know all things.” The voice answered, and Svlad looked the other way towards a doorway that lead into a pure white hellscape this dream space was made of.

“You have said that before, but you never tell me anything.” Svlad stated with a pout as he rested his elbow on the table and his chin in his hand. “It smells like rot and death in here…”

“Yes.” He glanced towards where the voice was coming from before he dropped his hand on the table. Waiting the doorway and waiting for them to come out, waiting to see them even if it was just a part of them. “He brings it with him everywhere he goes. He doesn’t mean to.”

“Is Abigail in danger?” He asked there was a silence that followed before he heard a soft laugh coming from the other room. Stifled and amused making Svlad feel like he asked something wrong. He frowned before hearing them take in a deep breath.

“Svlad, that’s sweet, we’re all in danger.” Svlad frowned from that. “Is she in any more danger than anyone else? No. She’s doing better if Thomas can’t see her.” They informed and Svlad supposed they had a point with that.

“Please, come out here and talk to me?” Begging, there was finally movement in the doorway, he could see a hand wrapping around the corner and part of a silhouette poking its head around. But he couldn’t see any detail, it was like staring at a shadow that had a physical form. “When can we meet?” He asked with tears starting to fill his eyes. “Tommy is… Tommy is making me question things and I can’t… I can’t. That life is behind me, this is my life now. I just… I don’t know what to do, tell me what to do.” There was a long pause and slowly the silhouette began to pull away from the corner.

“We can’t meet yet, so I cannot offer you personal advice. I’m sorry but it doesn’t work that way right now.” Svlad felt desperate from the change of tone, from them starting to vanish around the corner again.

“Wait! I’m sorry! Wait, I’ll be patient. But can you please tell me why?” He begged. There was a long pause and he could see the silhouette coming back into view.

"He’ll show up and stop it, because you’re not ready.”

“Hugo you mean?” He asked in a soft tone of voice.

“Mhmm, he is supposed to keep order, what you’re asking for is chaos. Be patient, Svlad.” He hated being patient, he sucked at it. He stared down at the table before looking to the phonograph, watching it as it continued to spin and the song played through the room, getting passed the first part of it for once, he bit his lip watching how the further and further the song went on the more distorted and broken the disc began to become. He was starting to hear that other voice, the one singing along, the one on Shiloh’s voicemail. He stared and could see movement out of the corner of his eye. Glancing over he could see two shadows dancing, laughing happening with the song playing. He looked back to the phonograph when it stopped and the shadows dissipated into nothing.

“Hugh…” He said the name as he stood up and headed over to the phonograph. Slowly picking the disc up to stop the music, he looked to the name scratched into it fingers tracing over each letter. “They’re the one who like this song?”

“See, you don’t need me to tell you anything, Svlad.” Svlad stared at the record, spinning it in his hands as he thought of the name, trying to think of how to bring it up. He flinched when he heard someone clear their throat, turning around he could see Hugo standing next to him.

“You’re going to forget how to wake up.” Svlad stared at him, and then slowly looked passed him and towards the movement he saw. Seeing the silhouette of his friend watching from the corner. “You’ve been here for hours. You need to wake up.” He kept his eyes on them realizing they weren’t watching, their back was turned to them, they were slowly rocking from side to side staring out into the white space. He slowly followed their line of view eyes lingering on the red door that hauntingly hung at the end of the hall, the black smoke seeping out of the crack that was in it.

“Svlad.” He could feel himself being shaken before he slowly looked to Hugo who was waving a hand in front of his face.

“Hugo…” he glanced up from hearing Priest’s voice. “What if I don’t want to wake up anymore?” He asked while looking towards him back to his friend who had stopped moving.

“Svlad, don’t say that.” Hugo stated in a rushed voice while looking around, Svlad could notice vaguely how the room started dimming. He could feel Hugo grab his shoulders and shake him. “Take that back.”

“I like it here.” He watched as his friend slowly turned their head towards him, his form slowly taking shape as something other than a shadow.

He woke with a jolt, sitting up and gasping as he put a hand on his chest. Taking in deep heavy breaths while looking around the room in confusion. He got out of the bed and looked around trying to figure out what had happened. He looked down to notice there were some pads stuck to his chest that looked like what was in an AED—he looked over to see one in Priest’s hands. Watching the man rub his face with a tired sigh.

“Did… did I just die?” He asked with a look of concern.

“Heart wasn’t stopped for too long.” Pete commented, he looked passed them to see Tommy was asleep on the couch and Theo was watching them from the floor with a look of concern that quickly hardened into an expression of anger when they locked eyes.

“You were in that dream again.” Priest pointed out getting a small sigh from Svlad as he peeled the pads off his chest and sat down on the bed. He rubbed his face trying to remember what all happened, it honestly was feeling like the memory of it was escaping him. He narrowed his eyes trying to remember what all happened, he was talking to his friend and then Hugo showed up…

“I… I don’t remember what all happened.” He stated, wondering if dying had something to do with it… He could feel tears in his eyes wondering if he almost died because he wanted to. He closed his eyes from that, remembering last time he died he was almost with Todd and Farah again. He was so close, and they were both here for him, he could join them. He could…

“Svlad.” He looked to Priest when the man put his hand on his shoulder. “Talk to me.”

“I was staring at the phonograph as White Room played in a very disturbing way through the room and Hugo showed up and told me I was there for too long and I needed to wake up. But I couldn’t.” He could see Priest narrowing his eyes, catching the lie and Svlad took in a shaky breath before slowly letting it out. “I didn’t want to.” He corrected himself.

“And why didn’t you want to?” Priest asked as Pete moved to go over to the brothers.

“Because I like it there, Mr. Priest, it’s nice there.” Even with the rot and the decay and the rats, and the song. He has someone he can talk to and be truthful with and he’s met with honesty and bluntness in a way he doesn’t get. He has a friend who tells him how things are straight up and hasn’t played mind games with him. He feels at peace there, he feels comfortable there, and he’s so close to being with his friend and meeting them for real.

“Nice in the place where there’s monsters trying to kill you?” He asked with an amused grin and Svlad slowly looked away.

“I haven’t seen them in this place, Mr. Priest, it’s just my friend.” Priest clicked his tongue and Svlad slowly looked at him, he could see the annoyance lingering under the surface.

“You don’t even know who they are or what they are, Svlad, I told you not to trust it.” Svlad looked away from him while hugging his legs to his chest. “Have you actually met it yet or is it still avoiding you? I mean, fuck, Svlad, that thing could be one of those things that was _eating_ people in Blackwing.” Svlad slowly looked over to him with tear filled eyes. Sniffling while pointing to Pete.

“They said Pete wants them.” He spoke under his breath. “They’re afraid of him.” He was whispering low hoping that Pete wouldn’t hear it as he looked away. “I just… I’m sorry Mr. Priest, I’m tired, and I can’t deal with this right now.” He motioned towards Tommy.

“You’re doing really well.” He looked up at him, feeling the tears run down his cheeks as Priest stood up and in front of him. “You’ve found a lot of clues already even with everything and you’re doing what you should.” The man leaned down to kiss him on the forehead before motioning towards the dresser that was in the room. “Why don’t you eat and then we can get started.” Svlad could see pancakes waiting for him and he slowly got up to grab the plate.

“Thank you, Mr. Priest.” Glancing over he could see Tommy was awake now staring at the scars that were visible on his body. Normally Svlad would try to hide it, but right now he couldn’t be bothered to care as he climbed back in the bed and ate his pancakes.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tommy helps Svlad and Priest with their case! He hates every moment of it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CHARACTERS: Osmund Priest. Svlad Cjelli. Pete Cook. Thomas. Theodore. Todd Brotzman. Farah Black.  
WARNINGS: Angst. A shit ton of Angst. POV Change.

“What are you looking for exactly?” Priest ended up asking as he leaned on the wall and watched Pete look Thomas over. Like he was studying him, taking his time to really get a feel for the boy. He wondered what was going on through Pete’s head, wishing the man showed some fraction of emotion that wasn’t joy. He watched as Tommy tried so hard to shove Pete away while Theo fought his restraints trying to get to them.

“Let him go!” Theodore shouted and Priest wondered what all Pete was trying to learn as he glanced at the TV which was only on to muffle the noise happening in the room.

“The usual.” He didn’t sound very interested in answering. Playing vague and coy as Pete tried to get Thomas to look at him. Priest found himself annoyed with it as Pete just smiled. “It doesn’t necessarily concern you now does it, Mr. Priest?” Pete asked while playfully smacking the boy’s cheek, watching how Thomas seemed to be refusing to look at him. Priest watched Pete tilt his head to the side, he could see the large pleased smile on his face. 

“Just let us go, or at least Theo he hasn’t--”

“How many people are in the room with us?” He watched as Tommy’s eyes flickered to next to them before looking away again. “Answer me, or I’ll force you to let everyone in who wants to move on.”

“You can’t.” Tommy looked scared while finally facing him, eyes darting around his face like he wasn’t sure where to look.

“Pete seems skilled with forcing projects to use their ability whenever he feels like it.” Priest stated, watching as Tommy looked over to him and tried harder to get away.

“A lot, there’s a lot one moment.” Tommy stated in a rushed tone while turning to look around the room, counting on his fingers before slowly looking back to Pete. “Fifteen, there’s fifteen, that’s counting us.” Tommy told him and Pete hummed while leaning back. “There’s normally more, but I got a small break when I… when I let some cross over the other day.”

“How many came with us?” Pete asked and Priest slowly glanced over towards Svlad who just finished getting dressed and was heading over to them. Lingering in the doorway as Tommy took in a deep breath, while looking over them.

“One with you. Surprisingly Priest doesn’t have any, then again unsurprising at the same time, cause sure he kills people but who would wanna stick around, you know?” He rolled his eyes and Priest just gave an amused grin from that before his eyes drifted to Svlad. “He has two.” Priest could see briefly a flicker of annoyance on Pete’s face as he looked from Tommy over to Svlad. There was a look in his eyes that was hard to place which had Svlad stepping back.

“I’m assuming those two would be Mr. Brotzman and Miss Black?” Pete finally asked as Tommy nodded his head. “I’ll stay here with Theo, why don’t you three continue your investigation.”

“No! Why can’t Theo come with us?” Tommy asked in a desperate tone while moving closer to Pete. Willing to put himself back in the man’s grasp in order to try and protect his brother.

“I’ll be fine, Tommy.” Theo stated while looking between them. “Don’t worry about me, I can handle this asshole.” He offered Tommy a kind smile and there was a moment of hesitation before Priest stepped over and grabbed Tommy by the back of his neck. Squeezing it as he led him out of the hotel room. Svlad was following quickly behind him as they made their way down the hallway.

\---

“Let go of me, I can walk by myself.” Tommy ducked down out of Priest’s grasp and straightened his jacket while glancing back towards the room. Pouting as he stuffed his hands in his jacket pockets, “What even is the next plan exactly?” He asked while looking between Priest and Svlad eyes stopping on Farah who was crossing her arms over her chest and held a calculating look on her face.

“Well, we should start asking Emery about the mystery person in that picture with Abigail.” Tommy’s eyes drifted over to Priest who was moving closer to them, he stumbled back even as Farah moved between them with Todd like they could protect him from the man. Priest walked through them easily with a large grin on his face causing Tommy’s eyes to tear up.

“Shit, Tommy, don’t tell me you’ve already forgotten what we’re doing. How exactly are you coping with your little voices problem anyway?” Tommy let his eyes drift away towards Svlad who just stood there staring at the floor as Farah and Todd tried desperately to make Priest back away only to continuously go through him.

“I… nothing… just sound. I’m not doing drugs if that’s what you’re implying.” He took another step back before giving a small scoff. “Well… shit… okay so  _ pot _ every now and then but that just helps me sleep.” He added before looking back to Priest hating how he told him all that and felt the need to tell him all that. “I’m just a little worried about the fact we just left my brother with a demon to keep my mind on his stupid fucking case. Which I want no part in! By the way!”

“Uh-huh, we’re going to Emery’s place. Here’s the address, congratulations, Tommy, you’re our guide for your small little town.” Tommy grunted but snatched the address from Priest before leading the way. Silently passing Svlad looking back at him he finally looked back ahead and lead them towards where they needed to go.

“I thought Blackwing closed down, so what the fuck happened to bring it back?” Tommy finally asked while glancing over at them. Priest clicked his tongue and shrugged his shoulders while matching pace with him. Tommy watched Svlad link their arms together and slowly looked to Todd who was trying to push pull them apart.

“New management. Nice to see how well things go about when someone competent takes the reigns.” Priest stated so bluntly, Tommy looked to their linked arms and Todd’s desperation and anger yelling at Priest to stop touching him he slowly looked to the floor.

“In other words, the place is a horror show now. Not that it wasn’t originally.” Tommy commented while rolling his eyes. “Can’t believe they bothered to bring you back, always felt like they probably executed you.” He stated while glaring at him over his shoulder.

“Okay, I have to ask, I know you have injured Mr. Priest enough to leave a scar, but you also seem so young.” Tommy pouted his lips, looking from Svlad to Priest before shrugging.

“He startled me while I was talking to… another person who was there. I don’t know, Priest came through it and I wasn’t expecting it not with what he was talking about... and I stabbed him. I don’t regret that it happened, just kind of wished it did more.” Priest rolled his eyes that time.

“Please, you freaked out when you realized what you did and spent the whole time crying and apologizing and asking the doctor if I was going to be okay.” Priest sounded amused and Tommy grit his teeth while hugging his jacket closer to himself, staring out at nothing in silence for what felt like too long. Especially as other voices started to come out, overlapping one another begging and pleading for his attention, trying to touch him. Trying to drag him out of his thoughts as he stared at the floor for a long time before coming to a stop. He turned around and looked at Priest, pointing a finger at his face as he made himself as big as possible.

“I was  _ six _ ! I thought you were going to kill Theo because of what I did!” He said the words in a dark tone, Priest ran his tongue over his top lip as he stepped closer. Tommy pulled his hand away, feeling himself shaking as he turned around again and continued to walk. “I was scared, don’t you  _ dare _ take my fear and  _ assume _ I felt bad for stabbing you, because I don’t.”

“Wait, wait, wait.” Svlad pitched in and they both looked at him, there was a cheeky smile on his face as he stared up at Priest. “You got stabbed by a child who didn’t even realize you were there?” Tommy watched as Priest moved and shoved the boy by his face, Svlad just laughed while moving to catch up to them. There was something about the display that just put Tommy on edge, especially seeing Todd looking so angry as he stared at Priest.

“Here we are.” Tommy stated as he came to a stop outside the house. He stared at it for a while, eyes locked on a window where he could see someone standing in the window, when none of the others said anything about it he assumed they weren’t really there. He could see a few more poking out trying to see. “I’m not going in there.” Tommy added while looking towards Priest and Svlad, the younger of the two already heading for the door.

“Oh… How come?” Svlad asked with a type of curiosity and innocence.

“You should go, I can talk through you.” He glanced at Farah before his eyes set into a glare.

“No, that’s not how this works. Look just…” He rubbed his face with a grunt. “Go do your thing I’ll sit out here and—” He flinched when Priest grabbed him by the arm. He could feel the biting vice like grip down to his bones, he looked to the man silently before he was dragged along like he was nothing. Snow kicking up around his feet as he was dragged to the home that was filled with more things he didn’t want to deal with. “Please?”

“Think of it like back home, Tommy.” He looked to the man with fear, it was hard not to think about. He had nightmares about the nights of being stuck with Priest, sleep deprived and on edge. So, overstimulated by sound that he felt like he was going to die. Willpower brought down to nothing so he had no choice but to let the ghosts pass. How he passed out from pain only to be brought back to Priest standing there with a sadistic smile on his face telling him he still had a job to do. “They leave you alone after, don’t they?” Tommy swallowed while watching Svlad knock on the door.

“I don’t want this job.” He said it under his breath, he felt sick when Priest just leaned in while releasing his arm.

“You don’t have a choice.” Tommy closed his eyes looking away out towards the sidewalk, he didn’t want to do this. He just wanted to hang out with Theo… and hoped he was okay back at the hotel room with Pete. He looked back to the door when he heard it open and could see an older woman at the door looking confused.

“Hello?”

“Hi! I’m Svlad Cjelli, a detective on the case for Abigail Holmes, is Emery home? I hear her and Abigail were friends.” He smiled at her and the woman looked from him to them. “Oh, this is my Assistant, Mr. Priest, and Thomas here is helping out with the case.” He explained easily, he could see Todd out of the corner of his eye glaring at Priest.

“Assistant!? Seriously!?” Todd shouted in annoyance. “He’s your kidnapper and torturer, Dirk!” Tommy slowly looked away as Todd continued shouting obscenities, letting all the noise drown out as he slowly followed them into the house.

“You’re that  _ medium _ .” The woman eventually said and snapped Tommy out of his thoughts.

“Yeah.” He didn’t like how she said the word, he could feel her eyeing him pretty hard and he ignored it while moving closer to Svlad. They paused in the kitchen and eventually a teenager came over to join them. She looked between the three of them before sitting down at the table with them.

“Emery, hi, I’m Svlad Cjelli a detective looking for Abigail. I hear you and her are friends?” She slowly nodded while glancing towards her mother then looked back.

“Yeah, I already spoke to the police, I don’t know anything.” Priest moved that time and pulled the photograph out from his inside jacket pocket and laid it on the table for Emery to see. The girl stiffened before looking back to Priest with shock. “Look it ain’t nothin like you see. Abby and I know him from around, we’s just friends is all, ain’t nothin goin on between those two.” She sounded defensive.

“Is he older than them?” Tommy looked to Farah. The woman looking interested. “Ask her if he’s older than them. That might be why she’s defensive.”

“Is he older than you?” Tommy finally asked after a moment of looking at Farah, not realizing he had cut Svlad off due to being so distracted by the woman next to him.

“… I think so… You don’t know him though, Hugh wouldn’t hurt a fly.” She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear while looking towards her mother, the woman looking in obvious shock.

“Emery! Why didn’t you tell the police about this man? He could have Abigail!”

“He ain’t like that, Mama.” Tommy let his gaze drift over to Svlad when he heard Todd sounding concerned. He let his eyes linger on him seeing the look of shock on his face, it was the same look he had when he recognized the song that played through the voicemail.

“Where—where do you two normally meet up with Hugh?” Svlad finally managed to ask, Emery looked away from her mom over to them.

“By the old train yard.” She offered while rubbing her arm, looking between them. “But it’s a mistake. Hugh really wouldn’t hurt Abby, found him cryin over a spider once.” She stated while shifting in her chair. Tommy looked to the ghosts that started to pile into the room, realizing that they figured out who he was. He could feel anxiety clawing at him as he stuffed his hands in his jacket pockets staring at the floor now.

“Where in the train yard do y’all usually hang out?” Priest finally asked, Tommy kept his eyes on the floor, he could feel them all surrounding him. His skin felt like it was tingling and there was a chill running up his spine as he felt their ghostly breath breeze across his skin. The noise in the room began to fade into their breathing and the electrical whine of the lights above them.

“Tommy.” He snapped out of the thoughts and looked to Priest with wide tear filled eyes. “Time to go.” He was quickly to hurry out of the house, stepping around ghosts that stood in his way despite being able to go through them. He just didn’t want them to touch him, he couldn’t handle the cold spiderweb like sensations right now. “You have to let them in.”

“No.” Tommy said quickly while looking towards Priest. “I’m not doing it, you don’t understand how much it hurts.”

“Ever wonder if it would stop hurting if you did it regularly. I believe I got you to a point one time where you said it just tickled.” Tommy felt sick as he looked between the man’s eyes and pulled away, continuing down the road.

“Train yard, right?” He asked while continuing to hurry down the sidewalk, kicking snow as they made their way to the destination.

\---

The Train Yard felt sad.

Svlad frowned as he looked around the old rusting trains, could see ruined shipping containers laid about, along with old vehicles that were dumped there. It looked more like a junkyard than a Train Yard. He maneuvered through it all, being mindful of his step as the snow continued to fall and pile up covering most of… well everything. He tried to get a sense of what was in the area, tried to understand more about this place to feel for it.

“It’s sad here.” Was all Svlad finally managed to say, Tommy was watching from the station, standing there looking out at the yard. “Did something happen here?” Svlad finally asked, getting a small sigh from Tommy.

“Yeah, this place was known for suicides… Got shut down after someone drove their truck head on into a train, derailed it, killed hundred.” He kept staring out at nothing and Svlad couldn’t help but wonder if Tommy saw the people who had died here. Or close to here. He continued to move through the junk glancing at Priest who was far ahead of them, he could notice the man looking back every now and then like he was keeping an eye on Tommy. Svlad finally sighed and moved up to join Tommy.

“Are you okay--” 

“Don’t, please just don’t. I don’t care what your boyfriend and friend say about you. I am not, and never will be, your friend. Just do your stupid case, the sooner it’s over the sooner Theo is free.” Tommy snapped, while looking away from him. Svald stood there in shock, hand on his heart and tears in his eyes immediately from the statement.

“I don’t have a boyfriend”

“Oh right, he’s dead, only  _ I _ can see him.” He pointed to where Todd must have been and Svlad could feel more tears in his eyes. “Which I guess is good for you. Cause, if you could see him now, if you could see the pain and agony he must have been in--” Svlad watched him trail off, watching him look to a different side. Watching how he seemed to slowly be processing what he was being told before looking right at him. And it was a new look he wasn’t expecting to see from anyone. It wasn’t pity, or mock sincerity, it was a look of understanding.

It was a look of sorrow, of horror, of  _ anger _ . All looks he could feel radiating off Tommy as he slowly dropped his hand. Svlad knew that Farah must have told him to stop. That one of them, or maybe both of them, explained to Tommy that he got to sit there and watch. That he had to be a witness to the horrific nightmare that Priest put Todd and Farah through. Tommy didn’t say anything else, he just continued to process as his eyes trailed off to locate Priest. That anger still there as he stared him down from their current position.

“Hey, Svlad… I still hate you.” He stated while moving towards Priest, Svlad turned his head to follow his line of view seeing the man wave them over he trailed after Tommy. Reaching Priest who motioned to the ground with his machine gun.

“Now I don’t know about you two, but that don’t look normal to me.” Priest stated Svlad looked to the snow that was kicked around and not peaceful and untouched like most things in this area. It looked like someone had been there recently, perhaps even around the same time as them. The thing that had caught Priest’s eye was the fact there was an ear lying on the ground. It looked in heavy stages of decay and there was no blood around it.

“I mean, I don’t often find ears lying in the snow.” Svlad stated as he knelt down to get a closer look at it. It was definitely real, especially from the stench of rot coming from it that had Svlad covering his mouth and nose as he leaned back. “Perhaps… we should call in the police for this?” Svlad watched with slight horror as Priest adjusted his gloves and leaned down to pick the ear up. Looking it over, he was about to just drop it till his eyes locked on the snow where it once used to be.

Svlad looked down to the black blood that was in the snow, watching Priest turn it around to look taking note that it didn’t appear to have any blood left.

“Hey, Tommy, this look different to you?” Priest asked while holding the ear up.

“Looks like your average human ear that’s been drained of blood if that’s what you’re asking.” Tommy finally stated and Svlad narrowed his eyes while standing up.

“Why?” He finally asked, wanting to know what was going on in Priest’s head.

“Well, Tommy here says that Pete looks like a monster, right? He also has black blood, figured I would see if the owner of the ear looks like a monster too.” He commented while dropping the ear back into the snow.

“Does Pete often just lose body parts?” Svlad asked curiously seeing as Priest was the one who spent the most time with him.

“Not that I’ve noticed.” Svlad groaned while moving to rub his face, standing up and motioning around.

“Look, I know this case just started, but I’m already getting annoyed here. So far all we have clue wise is Tommy being able to help us, if Abigail shows herself again, a heavily distorted picture of a potential kidnapper, and an  _ ear _ . This is ridiculous--” He turned to look towards Tommy when he felt a hand on his shoulder. “Yes?”

“Abigail’s back.” He said it in a whisper, under his breath like he didn’t want to scare her away. He took in a deep breath and slowly let it out. “Hey, Abigail, if you can hear me can you lead us to you?” He asked in a soft voice. Svlad watched as his eyes shifted from side to side, squinting at nothing as he tried to read whatever was going on.

“Anything?”

“I don’t think she can hear me… I’m not really the best at charades either. I don’t know what she’s trying to say…” Svlad perked up while watching Tommy.

“I am excellent at charades, mimic what she’s doing!” Tommy just shot him a look of disbelief.

“Farah and Todd disagree.” Svlad gasped, putting a hand over his heart as he grinned.

“They are lying, I am the best at Charades, I win every time.” Svlad stated, watching a smile spread on Tommy’s face as he looked off to the side he could already imagine what Todd probably said to that. That; ‘no one being able to guess what you’re doing doesn’t make you win.’ He missed his voice, his smile became sad as he tried to remember what Todd sounded like… was it possible to forget that? 

He was having a hard time remembering what he looked like, he could remember his height. How he was perfect huggable size, his beautiful blue eyes that had a shine like a bright clear sky. The ones you always wanted to stare at even if the sun was so bright you had to shield yourself. 

But so much about Todd was fleeting from his memory. His smell was fading from his memory, his voice was long gone, and his face… He could remember him bloodied, and in pain, dying in his lap while he was unable to do anything about it as he choked to death on his own blood… but he couldn’t remember what he looked like before… He tensed when he felt a hand on his shoulder, looking over it he stared at Priest who was leaning in.

“Don’t worry, Svlad.” He kept his eyes on him. “I have a plan to make them go away.” Priest reassured him. Svlad felt numb when the man let go, only now noticing Tommy had stepped a bit to the side and was trying to talk to Abigail. He didn’t know how he felt about them being gone, from what he heard of Tommy is sounded like that’s what happens to make them move on. And they should be happier if they finally move on instead of staying in this place.

But that just made it feel more final.

He wiped tears from his eyes while nodding his head to Priest, just letting him believe whatever he wanted. It made things easier that way, he just wanted to go back to bed, he wanted to go back to his dreams where it was nicer.

“Come on, let’s get food.” Priest finally stated as he lead them out of the train yard, back into town through the snow which was half way up his calves now. He glanced down at it as they trudged through the snow and to one of the restaurants that was there and still open. A small family owned restaurant, getting seated and served Svlad hugged his mug of hot chocolate close to him. Slowly getting feeling back in his fingertips from the small break.

“She doing anything different?” Svlad finally asked while looking over to Tommy who was happily stuffing his face with fries.

“Nah, just back to sitting on the ground crying.” He sighed while looking over to where she must have been. He glanced in that direction with a frown, “she doesn’t appear hurt… She looks fine I don’t know what’s happening to her though and why she won’t talk to me.”

“Maybe she’s on the brink of death.” Priest finally stated.

“If that’s the case she’s clearly more alive than dead from disappearing for a full day--” Tommy cut himself off as he stared at the corner with a look of shock on his face. “Oh shit… you can hear me now?” He watched as Tommy slowly turned his head back to them. “Well, looks like Abigail isn’t hanging on as strong as before.”


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Things heat up with the detective trio as Priest and Thomas get into a fight. That leads to Tommy getting hurt. Meanwhile Pete and Theo have a nice conversation back at the hotel before taking a trip to go pick up the other three.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CHARACTERS: Svlad Cjelli. Osmund Priest. Thomas. Pete Cook. Theodore.  
WARNINGS: Abuse (emotional and physical), manipulation... snowball fight? POV Change

Svlad perked up, this was great news… well not for Abigail, obviously, but now they might be able to get somewhere now. He just hoped she would be able to be saved, it seemed cruel to be sent on a case to find someone’s dead body… unless the universe was actually sending him after Hugh, and Abigail was just the means to an end. He felt an anger budding inside of him for not only thinking that way, but because it seemed so probable with the way things had been going for him recently.

He leaned forwards over the table watching as Tommy stared at what he could only assume to be Abigail. Watching the way he pursed his lips before shifting in his spot.

“Okay… uhhh, do you know where you are?” He asked after a moment Svlad watched him furrow his brows and a slow expression of impatience crossed his face before he threw his hands up in the air and looked back at them. “Great! Just great, she has no idea where she is.” He crossed his arms over his chest while looking out at nothing.

“Course not, that would be easy.” Priest stated while continuing to drink his coffee. Svlad sighed while leaning more on the table to be closer to Tommy.

“Okay, is she with Hugh?” He asked watching as Tommy looked from him over to where Abigail must have been with a raised eyebrow. Tommy watched with a growing look of exhaustion before moving to wave his hands.

“Okay look, I don’t know the guy, I’m not here to judge the guy, I just want to find you. Don’t make excuses for him cause I _really_ don’t care I just want to find you so they leave me alone.” He pointed at Svlad and Priest, Svlad slowly slunk in his seat while glancing around noticing people were staring at them. Some of them talking amongst themselves staring at Tommy as they did it. They quickly looked away when they saw Svlad looking at them. Svlad turned this time to look towards where Tommy was, taking in a deep breath while trying to picture what the girl must look like from the two photos he saw of her.

“Abigail.” He said the name patiently. “We just want to help you.” He held sincerity and concern in his voice, eyes slowly glancing over to Tommy to see if he would translate what she was saying. Tommy slowly stood up with a look of irritation on his face while staring at where the girl was watching him take a step forwards while pointing a finger in midair.

“Fuck you.” He snapped the words while walking forwards, Svlad watched as he took in the view of people staring at them. “And fuck all of you too. Freak show’s over go back to your fucking food.” He kicked the table they were eating at before heading out the door. Svlad quickly got up and followed after him, concerned about what happened as Priest got up and threw money on the table, finishing his coffee before following after.

“Insulting a dying teenager seems a little—”

“Oh, go fuck yourself, I’m done with this and you can fuck off too!” He snapped over to his side Svlad couldn’t help but wonder what happened, watching as Tommy rubbed his head and then covered his ears, very clearly trying to block out what was happening around him. He grunted and knelt down, Svlad just watched feeling helpless to do anything. He watched Priest step over to him, standing in front of him before crouching down. Hand reaching out to grab Tommy by the hair, he turned to look around to see if anyone was watching as Priest dragged Tommy out of the protective shell he was making for himself.

“You want us gone, right, put your big boy panties on and be nice to the teenager.” Priest stated while letting go. “What she say anyway?”

“Like I would tell you of all people that!” Tommy snapped he sounded so angry and frustrated. “The case is closed, go away. She’s dying, who cares. Everyone dies.” Svlad could feel his heart beat pick up as he watched Tommy stand up. “That’s the circle of fucking life, now fuck off I’m done.” Tommy walked around Priest as the man stood up, and Svlad felt like he was running out of time as he watched Tommy head down the sidewalk. He could feel the anxiety racing in his chest telling him they were running out of time, and he didn’t understand fully what time was running out for but he… he couldn’t let the clock reach zero. He ran ahead and stopped in front of him holding his hands out to stop Tommy from going any further. “What?” He asked in absolute anger.

“What do you mean case closed!? Abigail just started to talk to you. Tommy please, we’re so close, I can feel it we just have to go a little further and then we’re done.” He was practically begging as he stepped closer to him, grabbing him by the shoulders, watching how Tommy’s eyes started to dart around them like he was looking at other people. His hardened look softening into one of pain as he pulled away from him and shook his head.

“She isn’t going to be able to help us. And will you just shut up for five seconds!” He lashed out at whoever else was talking to him. “She brought something with her because she’s not dead she’s not supposed to be out of her body. It’s… complicated.” He waved his hand.

“Complicated how?” He watched as Tommy’s eyes lingered on something else. Watching him go quiet, staring off to the side as he shifted.

“Okay, so… you have to bear with me here because this is my own understanding.” Tommy started while shifting and holding a hand out. “This is our plane of existence, right? Well there’s others that overlap and I stand between this one and the plane of the dead, a place I call the Inbetween. I’m called the guard to the underworld, or as Blackwing likes to call it, Cerberus, because I’m a gateway to _get_ people to the plane of the dead. The ones who linger don’t belong here they belong over there.” He motioned his other hand which he was using to explain for that. “You with me so far?” He finally asked.

“Yeah, all makes sense.” Svlad nodded as Tommy took in a deep breath.

“There are other… _things_ too. They belong to the plane of the dead.” Svlad watched him move his hands in front of himself. Staring at them for a moment before looking back up to him. “I see them like… well I don’t even know, they’re not necessarily good, but I wouldn’t lump them as evil either they know when things don’t belong places and they hunt them down. She doesn’t belong in the in between, or the plane of the dead, she belongs with the living.”

“She’s bringing these things?” Svlad asked while watching Tommy who slowly nodded his head.

“Yeah, but there’s another thing about them I haven’t touched on… They hate me because I’m an anomaly to them, so with her bringing them to her it means they will be drawn to me.” Tommy stated while crossing his arms over his chest, staring at the ground.

“And these things… With them not liking you what do they do?” Svlad asked in concern, Priest gave an amused laugh while stepping closer.

“Oh, so that’s what your little friend was, one of these guys?” Priest mused out getting a sharp glare from Tommy.

“Fuck you! It’s not funny!” He snapped getting a grin from Priest. Svlad looked between them while raising his hands trying to kill the tension. “They don’t like me, so they hurt me.”

“Make him hurt himself is more like it.” Priest added, Svlad looked from Priest over to Tommy who just hugged himself tighter, refusing to look at them. “From what we can gather these things, which we all just thought was another type of ghost, want him because of what he can do.” Tommy was grinding his teeth. “But he’s no use to them alive.” Priest spoke about it so coldly. There was a voice in his mind telling him this is why he shouldn’t like Priest. But he shoved it to the side while clearing his throat.

“We’ll protect you.” Svlad finally stated, getting a skeptic look from Tommy with the statement.

“No one can protect me. Especially neither of you.” He motioned between them. “Blackwing lackies who work for a government company that wants to ruin people like us. I mean look at you.” Tommy motioned at him and Svlad took a step back, there was a new look of disgust and hatred in his face. “You’re the poster child of why I will never go back there. Tortured to the point of being some brainwashed lackey to this fuck face.” Svlad let his eyes drop.

“Tommy, you’re being unreasonable.” Priest only sounded amused though.

“Go fuck yourself, Osmund.” Giving him the middle finger as he continued down the sidewalk. Svlad watched Tommy before looking to Priest not sure what to do other than hug himself to try and stay warm. “I’m packing my shit and I’m leaving so they won’t find me. Good luck with your case.”

“We still have Theo.” Priest called out and Svlad watched as Tommy came to a stop and turned around to face him. His anger melting into sorrow as he stepped forwards while pointing at him.

“I’m getting him back first!”

“How do you plan on doing that, Tommy?” Priest was egging him on and Svlad didn’t know what to do in that situation while looking between both of them. “Bet you Pete’s already got him interested in joining Blackwing.”

“Don’t you dare!” Tommy shouted, tears in his eyes, his voice already sounded like it was cracking. And Svlad knew it was because Tommy felt that was possibility. That Theo would actually want to join them again, it made his heart hurt just watching them. “I won’t let you fuckers use him again!”

“He was such a great asset to the team.” Priest continued on, Svlad took a step back when Tommy actually ran at Priest and took a swing. Priest caught Tommy easily and threw him over his shoulder hard into the snow while giving an amused chuckle. “Surprised he never taught you how to fight.” Priest added while standing up straight. Svlad moved over to Tommy who laid there with a look of anger on his face, he slowly held a hand out to him to try and help him up, but Tommy just smacked it out of his way. Clambering to his feet before turning to face Priest while pointing up at his face.

“He will _never_ go back to Blackwing!” Priest grabbed Tommy by the finger and Svlad could feel himself tense up as Priest twisted it and brought Tommy down to his knees. He glanced around to see if anyone was watching while getting closer.

“Always were so selfish, Tommy, never bothered to ask Theo what he wanted, did you?” He hummed out the question, Svlad flinched at the sound of a bone breaking and Tommy crying out in pain, yanking away from him and holding his hand to his chest. “Don’t point your finger in my face again or I’ll cut it off.” Priest stated so calmly, and Svlad dropped his eyes to the ground from the threat. Hugging himself and flinching when he felt a hand on him. He glanced up to Priest with tear filled eyes and tried his best to blink them back.

“He’s not going back.” Tommy stated in pain from his spot on the ground.

\---

“I think you should come back to Blackwing with us. I know you miss it.” Pete stated so bluntly while writing notes in his black notebook on Theodore. He had basic things about him written down, his physical description, his abilities, what he can force him to do. All of that, but now he was writing down miscellaneous things he noticed about him. Like how his most comfortable fidgeting response as to hold his hands in his lap and flick his thumbnails together. How good his fear smelled, how when he thought he wasn’t watching he would work on his restraints in a way Pete was sure he would be out of them in no time.

“I’m not going back.” Theo finally stated, staring at the floor because Pete knew he was tempted, Pete just smiled while slowly closing his notebook.

“You don’t want to go back because it feels like a betrayal to Tommy.” He stated while slowly opening his book back up, flipping through all the notes he had written down about Theodore. “You had a good time there, they gave you a sense of purpose. They made you feel better about what you do.” Pete stated, he had read everyone’s files, looking more into people’s personalities than the bullshit the scientists had written in for them. “You see… I have realized people like you and Priest who have abilities to do with assisting other projects tend to like Blackwing.” He watched Theo look away, head turning so he was pretty much not facing him. “There’s nothing wrong with that, you got it easy after all.” Pete stated only for Theo to look back at him with a glare.

“I may not have been through the same shit Tommy went through but don’t you dare tell me what I went through was easy.” Pete clicked his tongue, hand moving to his glasses and slowly taking them off while cleaning them. “You people dragged us away from our mother and didn’t let us see her. I know she was there I ran in to her and everyone lied to my face and told me that I was imagining it!” Pete didn’t say anything he just watched him through blurred vision before slowly putting the glasses back on. Blinking a few times before standing up, moving over to sit on the couch in front of him.

“You loved Blackwing even with that.” He watched as Theo slowly looked to his hands. “Sure, they lied to you about your mom. Who cares? You were raised by Blackwing, not her. Instead of being stuck with scientists and all that when they couldn’t quiet figure out your abilities you were given to the soldiers. You were raised and trained to be an agent. You were given the privilege of staying with Tommy because he felt safe with you. Yes, it was used against you to keep you in line, but you enjoyed the work when you worked for them. Didn’t you?” Pete asked while tilting his head.

“It doesn’t matter—”

“It does, matter, Theo. You were given purpose, a sense of life, something you had been searching for, and then you gave it up because of your Brother.” Pete continued, watching as Theo looked up to him with an uncertain expression. Like he wanted to argue but there was nothing to disagree with in the statement. “That’s not fair to you.” He added watching Theo move to hug his knees to his chest, Pete went back to looking through his notes, eyes lingering on the data he had collected through their time outside of Blackwing. “You gave up families for him too. In and out of homes and foster care because Tommy kept ruining your chances of adoption with his abilities.”

“Stop it.” Theodore finally demanded, Pete just smiled from it and continued anyway.

“You had a family you really loved too.” He stated watching as Theo looked to him with a look of pain. “They were nice, they welcomed you both with open arms. They didn’t care about your previous records of being problem children… You had it good there, you had two months of peace and a feeling of belonging…”

“Please, stop?” Begging this time.

“And then Tommy brought up their dead child because he could see him.” Theo was looking away again. “He squandered that opportunity of you guys being able to stay _real_ fast. That was the first time you hated him wasn’t it?”

“Stop it!” Pete leaned forwards and motioned at him.

“And now you’re almost thirty, and you hate the life you’re in and you hate Tommy even more because while you run around from place to place with no home to come back to he gets everything… he doesn’t even want his abilities, you like yours, you listen to yours, you’re skilled with yours and you have nothing to show for it.” Theo was gritting his teeth while yanking at his restraints undoing all the hard-work he had done to almost get out of them in one simple movement.

“Just stop talking!” Pete shrugged while leaning back on the couch, looking to the TV that was on with an amused smile, whistling slightly to himself while closing his notebook, slipping it back into the inner pocket of his suit jacket. Pete moved a hand to his ear eavesdropping in on Priest and Svlad he slowly got to his feet. Grabbing the car keys, he reached down and untied Theo.

“You going to behave?” He asked and Theo rubbed his wrists before nodding, Pete eyed him for a moment before heading to the door, walking out with Theo in toe. He made sure the hotel room was locked behind them before continuing down the hall, glad Theo was playing along as they headed out and into the cold where Pete unlocked the SUV and got in. Turning it on and making sure it was on 4wheel drive he glanced over to his passenger. “Why don’t you brush the snow off.” He reached in the back and grabbed the brush while holding it out for Theo.

There was a long moment of silence before Theo grabbed it and stepped outside, Pete watched him as Theo closed the door, looking at him through what he could see through. And he could see those gears turning in Theo’s head that he could run right now. He moved his hand to the door handle, getting ready to get out and give chase. And then Theo made the smart choice of brushing the snow off the car, making sure it wouldn’t be a danger to anyone else on the road before Theo climbed and in, shivering and moving closer to where the heat was coming out.

“Thank you.” Pete mused while tossing the brush in the back, checking behind him before pulling out of the parking spot to drive to meet Svlad, Priest and Tommy.

\---

Priest had let Tommy roll around on the ground in pain for a while before finally picking him up out of the snow. Leading him off to the side he had him sit down on a bench, pulling out the small little emergency kit he had as he knelt in front of him and grabbed his injured hand. Examining the finger he broke before setting to work on putting it back into place. Having done this more than enough times to more than enough people so he knew exactly what he was doing.

“I feel like I should go to the doctors.” Tommy protested after a while of calming himself down, Priest let his eyes move from his finger up to him with an amused smile.

“Always were such a whiner, Tommy.” Priest mused while standing up straight and letting him go. “Fixing fingers isn’t that hard you’re going to be fine. Besides, I have lots of practice.” He hummed out getting a heavy eye roll from the boy who was just watching with a pout.

“So you say… watch it heal sideways.” He complained and Priest rolled his eyes while punching him in the shoulder.

“Toughen up, kid. The option is still available for me just cutting it off, since you’re so worried.” Priest shrugged, Tommy was quick to pull his hand away from that one while gaping up at him in obvious offense. “Got the tool for that right here.” Grabbing the hilt of the knife he had on his belt and slowly pulling it out, he watched with satisfaction as Tommy got up and moved away.

“Nope, nope, no this is… this is fine. Thank you.” He turned his back to him while hugging his hand and Priest just shrugged while slipping the knife back where it belonged. He glanced over to Svlad who was staring out at nothing and had been for a while. With a sigh he leaned down picking up a handful of snow, making a snow ball he turned and threw it hitting Svlad right in the face. He watched as Svlad stumbled back looking confused and offended in one go before he just smiled. Wiping the snow off his face while leaning down and grabbing his own.

“That’s cheating Mr. Priest, I wasn’t even ready.” Priest just shrugged a smile pulling across his own face while watching him.

“All’s fair in love and war.” He ducked when Svlad threw the snowball at him, watching as Tommy slowly turned to look at the two of them.

“Oh my god, you’re both children.” Priest arched a brow and reached down to get more snow. “Wait, don’t you dare—” Priest cut him off by hitting him with a snowball. Watching him turn and wipe the snow off as Svlad just laughed from his spot, Priest gave a surprised noise when Svlad used his distraction and actually got him in the shoulder. He turned to look at him watching Svlad continue to giggle, before looking to Tommy who had moved to get his own snow.

Having a snowball fight in the middle of the case probably wasn’t the most productive thing Priest had ever started. But it felt like it was necessary to keep Svlad from spiraling, the boy was too out of it lately and he needed to come back to reality. He needed to give him something nice from all the shit he had been going through. He needed to make Svlad more interested in him rather than that friend from his dreams. And if that meant childish acts, then so be it. It seemed to be helping both of them, Tommy didn’t seem as stressed, even as both of them teamed up on him.

Priest threw one more hitting Svlad who had pulled his jacket up when lights flashed at them. They stopped what they were doing Tommy in the middle of pulling back to throw the snowball at him as Svlad just stared at the SUV that was now staring right at them on the empty streets. The tension that they kept at bay slowly building as they all looked at Pete and Theo, watching as Theo got out of the front seat and moved to the back where he sat like Pete told him.

Tommy turned and threw the snowball hard at the SUV, they watched it spray every which way on impact before Tommy stood up straight. Glaring at the vehicle with unspoken hatred, Priest moved over and put an arm around Svlad, leading him towards the vehicle. Pete just had an amused look on his face watching them get closer. Tommy got in the back with Theo looking somewhat happy to be with his brother again.

Priest turned to give Svlad a kiss on the forehead. Seeing the smile crossing the boys face he rested his hand on his lower back and motioned him towards the vehicle. There was a hesitation as the boy stayed close to him, like he didn’t want this moment to go away before he eventually moved to get in the back of the seat with the brothers. Priest gave a soft sigh, and eventually got in the passenger’s seat.

“I send you three out to solve a case and you have a snowball fight.”

“Sue me.” Priest stated while crossing his arms over his chest, getting nice and comfortable. “I see you let Theo off his leash.” Priest commented, waiting for Pete to say something but he remained silent. “We gonna go anywhere or you just here to be an asshole?” Priest asked while arching a brow, Pete gave a soft smile, and Priest watched out of the corner of his eye as he moved and reached over. Grabbing him by the front of the shirt he yanked him into the center console and close to him. There was a larger smile on his face now, impatient as his eyes locked on his.

“You’re not taking this seriously, which is understandable coming from you.” He grunted when the man shoved him into the other side of the car, watching silently as Pete glanced back at Svlad. “But Svlad, honestly I’m just disappointed. You want this girl to be okay, right? And you’re playing games in the street instead.”

“I—we’re at a type of dead end. We were just—”

“I don’t want excuses, I want results.” Pete stated while reaching into his suit, Priest watched him pull out that notebook of his and eyed it when he could see Tommy’s name on the page he opened it up to. “Tommy, what all has Abigail been saying to you.”

“She doesn’t want us to judge Hugh. Really she’s just going on and on about how it’s not his fault and—”

“I mean for you to say; ‘fuck you’ and don’t be too surprised I have been eavesdropping on you three this whole time.” Pete added, there was a moment of silence, before Tommy shifted in his spot, Priest watched him through the mirror.

“Okay that wasn’t actually to her, it was one of those things. She cut off midsentence, I couldn’t hear her anymore and then she faded out of my vision and one of them stood behind her.” Tommy stated while shifting in his spot. “I just… I can’t help you they know where I am now, they won’t let her get close to me.”

“Then all you have is a name, this is a small town.” The man drove them just a little further before stopping in front of a house. “Go get a phone book.” Pete leaned over Priest and opened the door, Priest watched him with a glare before shoving the door the rest of the way open. Walking up to the house he knocked on the door and waited patiently for whoever was inside to answer, eventually an older woman opened the door and looked up at him with confusion.

“Good Afternoon, Ma’am, I was wondering if you happened to have a phonebook I could borrow.” She blinked up at him as he gave her a charming smile, a smile of her own appeared as she nodded and motioned him in.

“Yes, of course, it’s a bit too heavy for my old bones though.” Priest was amused by that as he walked in after her and she tried to kill time talking about the weather. Asking where he was from, by the time he left he also somehow ended up with the woman’s apple pie recipe, which he pocketed with the intent of trying it out one time. He headed back down to the car and climbed in while holding the phonebook out for Pete.

“Took you long enough.” He mused while flipping through the book.

“We don’t even have a last name, I don’t see how we’re going to get anywhere with this big plan of yours.” Pete didn’t answer, Priest watched as the man pulled out his pen. Finger sliding down along the names and stopping to circle random ones before handing the book back over to him.

“Those are all the Hugh’s that live here.” Priest stared at the book, honestly amazed how quickly Pete has gone through all of that information. “One of them has to have the girl, welcome to playing real detective kids.” Pete stated while putting the car in drive. “Give me the first address.”


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In the hunt for whoever has Abigail the team runs into some familiar faces no one was expecting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CHARACTERS: Svlad Cjelli. Osmund Priest. Pete Cook. Theodore. Tommy. Amanda Brotzman. Rowdy 3. Selena.  
WARNINGS: Abuse. Angst. Manipulation. Gun Shot Wound. More Angst.

They had been to four different houses, talking to people named Hugh who didn’t seem to be who they were looking for, they all seemed like dead ends. It was just constant disappointment and it was getting late in the night. Svlad was feeling anxious as he looked at Pete who was just fuming with ever growing annoyance each time they came back to the SUV empty handed. It was weighing on him heavily, he felt like a failure, each time coming back with nothing made it worse. He wanted to curl up and cry as he and Priest stood outside about to go back to the SUV.

“I’m sorry.” There were tears in his eyes as he looked over to Priest, watching the man pause and turn to look at him. There was a moment of silence before the man moved and put his arm around him. “I’m sorry, this isn’t how I work, or operate, I know I’m a detective and you’ve been teaching me to be better at detecting but I… I—”

“I’ll talk to him, you just get in back.” He looked up at him, not wanting to, he didn’t want to get in the SUV with Pete there. He shifted and took in a shaking breath before opening the back door and getting in with Theo and Tommy. Pressing himself back into the door to give the brothers space and not even daring to make eye contact with Pete.

“Nothing again.” The man stated it, it wasn’t a question this time, it was a statement that made his skin crawl, and everything feel wrong and gross. He huddled against he window, staring out at the snow letting the silence fill the car as tears filled his eyes, Priest got in and Svlad waited for him to save him from this feeling.

“He don’t work how you want him to Pete.” Priest stated and he let out a sigh of relief. “What you’re asking for isn’t how any of us work.” He motioned around the car, Svlad watched Pete out of the corner of his eye as the man shut off the car and slipped the keys in his pocket.

“Step out of the car Mr. Priest, I would like a word with you.” Svlad felt his heart in his throat as Pete opened the door and stepped outside. Waiting patiently in the cold for Priest to join him. There was a moment of silence before Priest grunted and shoved open his door, slamming it shut as he walked around the car to where Pete was. Svlad gave a surprised noise when he felt a hand on his shoulder, he turned to look at Tommy who seemed hesitant with what he was doing.

“Look… Svlad… I don’t know the full extent of what’s going on here. But your friend is being an annoying prick and I’m pretty sure he’ll haunt me forever if I don’t give you this for him.” Svlad arched a brow and felt stunned when Tommy pulled him away from the door and hugged him. It was a nice hug too, firm and comforting, Svlad could feel tears in his eyes as he moved and hugged the man back. Burying his face in the crook of his neck as tears threatened to overflow.

Svlad flinched when his door opened, he turned to look over his shoulder to see Pete standing there, he gripped on to Tommy tighter as the man grabbed him by the arm and pulled him out of the SUV.

“I told myself I wouldn’t interfere.” Svlad tried to grab Tommy and moved to grab Theo who tried to catch him. Both of them trying to grab him as Pete threw him down into the snow, Svlad gave a confused noise from the pain in his back from being thrown like that. He could see Priest moving to stand between them, having a protective stance over him only for Pete to practically throw the man a decent distance away from him. “But I’m losing my patience.” He watched as Pete leaned in grabbing him by the shirt to drag him up into a seated position.

“Wait—” He closed his eyes when he felt the man’s hand touch his forehead. There was a feeling rushing over him from the touch, he pulled away from him and moved to hold his head. Fearing what he would see when he opened his eyes, tears were slipping from the corner of them as he slowly opened them. He stared at Pete’s feet, and slowly looked up to him watching the man stare back at him with dead hollow eyes.

He quickly looked away having been able to see numbers above his head that had long since passed. 12.24.1973. He took in a shaky breath before slowly pulling himself to his feet, hugging himself as he swallowed the lump in his throat. Looking towards Tommy and Theo who were now outside he could see blurred numbers above their heads, the numbers even moved in ways making them illegible, same with Priest’s.

“Now. What do you feel?” He looked towards Pete, the man’s limbs looking slightly longer than they should, his teeth sharp behind that smile, cuts appearing along his skin he quickly looked away again.

“I feel like I need to go this way.” Svlad stated as he began to walk, not wanting to look at Pete as he hugged himself, he could feel the man’s eyes on him. Priest ended up at his side and he was thankful for the comfort as he moved and leaned in to the man’s side, stifling a cry when the man put his arm over his shoulder.

\---

They stood outside of a house that looked condemned, Tommy and Theo looking from the building over to Svlad who stood ahead of them. The building was completely boarded up, the windows were broken and there didn’t appear to be any place to really get in to it. Priest sucked on his teeth before sighing, pulling on the strap of his machine gun to get it behind him he pulled on his gloves and rolled up his sleeves.

He looked the doorway over to make sure it didn’t look like it would collapse as he tested the state of the wood, although cold it had suffered damage from the outside elements, and it snapped easily in his hands. He tossed a piece off to the side and continued until he had the door completely revealed. He moved his hand to the door knob and tried it only for it to not budge.

He gave an amused smile that they even bothered to lock it after pretty much blocking the whole thing. He lifted his foot and gave it a hard kick near the doorknob and watched the door break and fling open to reveal the old rotting house that was inside of it. He glanced down when Svlad ducked under his arm and slipped inside.

“One second.” He stepped back to glance at Tommy and Theo who were being watched by Pete before his eyes lingered on the man who stood out in the snow in his bright colorful blue suit. “Hey, Pete. Maybe this should be something you should check out. Don’t know how stable the ground is, and since ya don’t seem to get hurt like normal.” He shrugged watched as Pete turned to look at him that smile still on his face which was slowly just getting creepier from how much that asshole smiled.

“Why, Mr. Priest, I thought you would be happy to have some alone time with your boy.” The way he said that had Priest narrowing his eyes. There was something about the way he spoke that made it feel like some sort of threat. “I’ll stay out here with these two, you kids have fun now.” Waving a hand at them Priest sighed and looked back to Svlad who was waiting patiently.

Priest eventually gave up on his stand off with making Pete go first and turned on the flashlight on his machine gun while pointing it inside of the house.

“I’ll take point.”

“Oh, yes! Right, that is an excellent idea Mr. Priest, I will follow you.” Priest rolled his eyes as he glanced at the ground curious how stable the ground was going to be. So far it didn’t feel too bad as he cautiously walked deeper into the house.

“Step where I step.” He told Svlad, not needing him to go through the floor. “Where do you feel like we need to go?” He asked and stopped when he realized Svlad wasn’t following him anymore. He turned to look over his shoulder and blinked when he noticed the boy run off to another room. “Svlad.” He muttered but moved to follow him, they both stepped into a room that was filled with light. Priest lowered his machine gun as they looked around the dingy kitchen. Eyeing the food on the table that was rotting before he looked to Svlad who moved to touch a chair that was there. Hands lingering on the wood with a look on his face he couldn’t place.

“I’ve been here.” Priest didn’t like the way he said it, there was lingering sound of hope in his voice. “I sat right here.” He looked from the chair towards one of the doorways pointing at it. “My friend talks to me a lot from that room.” Priest watched as Svlad headed that way, he was slow but hopeful. Priest moved and grabbed Svlad by the wrist stopping him from continuing.

“We’re looking for a girl who’s potentially dying.” He watched as Svlad turned to look at him. An amused smile crossed Priest’s face. “Don’t tell me you don’t care.” There was a taunt there and Svlad looked to the hand around his wrist before looking up at him.

“I don’t know if I do… Tommy brought up a good point, people die all the time. Maybe she’s supposed to die, it wouldn’t be the first. Maybe my case is to find Hugh, my friend seems to know where Hugh is, maybe this is a clue.” Priest glanced towards the other room when he saw movement like a shadow moving across the room. He lifted his gun again, pulling Svlad behind him as he headed over and in to the room.

“Sneak Attack!” Priest grunted and turned around ducking to the side to dodge the crowbar Jacob so carelessly swung at him.

“Now, Jacob, I done told you it ain’t a sneak attack if you announce it.” Priest stated while moving to aim the machine gun at him. About to fire when a bat came into view at the corner of his eyes, because of _course_ Marty wouldn’t let this punk ass kid go in alone. He cursed and brought the gun up blocking the bat. Not getting hit at least, but the momentum did have him stumbling back, right into the wall which he found himself sinking into. The drywall was so rotten it made the wall soft. He made a face from the little hole in the wall he found himself in moving to pull himself out of it only for the wall he grabbed onto to cave in too.

He ducked when he saw the bat coming towards him, lifting a foot and kicking Martin hard in the stomach. The force of it pushing him through the entirety of the wall. He made a surprised noise and glanced back over his shoulder as he fell _out_ of the house and into the alley in a pile of snow. Staring up to see Martin peering out of the hole with a grin on his face before the man ducked back inside when Priest opened fire on him.

“Pete! Rowdy Three!” He snapped as he got up from the pile of snow and moved towards the back to see a bus that was heavily spray-painted in graffiti with ROWDY 3 on the side of it. It looked like an old school bus that was now decked out with whatever they needed. He raised his gun about to open fire on the bus when a sense of calmness washed over him. He glanced over and saw Selena standing there, hand moving to rest on his gun and aim it at the ground.

“Osmund, you shouldn’t point guns at people, that’s not safe.” There was something about it he almost wanted to listen to, until he reminded himself that was just her abilities at work. He opened his mouth about to argue until he heard the chaos happening from the house.

“Let go of me! Let go! I don’t want to go!” Priest glanced up and could see Martin carrying Svlad out of the house, the boy flailing in his grasp trying to get out of his grip as Jacob ran around them looking behind them. “Mr. Priest! Help!”

“It’s comin’ boss!” Jacob shouted and it took Priest a moment to realize Selena was moving away from him. He quickly stepped back into action raising the gun and shooting right at Martin’s feet, watching him stop and Jacob give a surprised noise as he stood right next to where a bullet had just gone into the ground.

“Drop the boy.” Priest demanded while aiming the gun at Jacob. “Or I’ll drop yours.” He grinned with the threat, keeping his eyes on him he heard someone running at him and turned aiming the gun towards them to see Amanda running full speed. She slammed into him before he could aim and stumbled from the ice under his feet. Managing to catch himself he grunted and brought his elbow down into her back, “I don’t have time for this, Miss Brotzman.” He snapped moving to grab her by the hair, about to pull her off until he heard a gun cock and felt it press against his side.

“You shouldn’t carry so many guns, dumbass, that’s dangerous for _you_.” Priest sucked on his teeth before a smile took over, the tensions growing as he haphazardly raised his hands. She stood up straight and kept the gun aimed at him, he watched her carefully before giving an amused laugh.

“You really gonna shoot me Miss Brotzman?” He asked with a daring smile, she didn’t even bat an eye as she aimed lower and pulled the trigger. Priest gave a surprised grunt, hand moving to his thigh where the bullet went in, he could see a smug smile cross her face the sound of Svlad crying out fading into white noise as a grin crossed Priest’s face through the pain. “Marty! I like your girlfriend, she’s actually got balls unlike you.” He could see the flash of bright blue and blinked when Pete ended up standing between himself and Amanda.

“Who the frick are you—”

“Peter Cook, but please, call me Pete. And you must be Amanda Brotzman. Other known aliases are; The Rowdy Queen, Drummer, Boss…” He sounded so calm just looking at his little notebook before looking back up to Amanda. “They think so highly of you don’t they? That must be so nice for you.” There was a condescending tone in his voice.

“BOSS! Move! That’s it that’s the thinG!” He could hear Jacob shouting in panic from his spot. Priest could see her retreating still aiming the gun at Pete while backing away.

“Hush, Vogel, the grownups are talking.” Pete called out to the boy while continuing to follow Amanda, there was something in his movements that looked, off. Priest couldn’t quite place what it was about it. “What do you prefer I call you?” Pete finally asked while walking towards her the second she began to retreat.

“Don’t call me anything, eyesore!” She snapped back at him, Priest couldn’t help but notice neither Tommy or Theodore was with the Rowdy Three or Pete, made him wonder if Pete took so long because he was stopping them from going anywhere.

“Nothing then? Is that what you want?” There was a small laugh with that. “I can easily call you _nothing_.” He watched as the man had turned and was walking after her, slow and deliberate with his movements, Priest could hear the gun go off, but Pete didn’t even flinch. “That’s all you are though, isn’t it?” He watched as the man opened his jacket to put that notebook of his away. “Nothing.” He continued as the rest began backing away. Jacob grabbing Selena and leading her to the van as Martin passed Svlad off to Gripps and moved to Amanda.

“Drummer, we gotta go.” He said it hurriedly and Priest could see actual fear in Martin’s eyes as he stared up at Pete. Priest couldn’t help but notice the reflection of Pete’s face in the man’s glasses looked off and distorted.

“Acting like your life finally means something because you found a group of like-minded people, you’re still the sick scared little girl you’ve always been.” Martin was staying out of reach of Pete while grabbing Amanda and pulling her back as she shot Pete again.

“Fuck you!” He could see Pete’s head tilted back before he slowly moved to look back ahead at them.

“You will always be nothing if you stay out here. Why don’t you, the Rowdy Three, and Selena come back to us?” He watched as Pete looked towards Selena. “Selena, we have your boys. Thomas and Theodore. You should see them now, they’re both so grown from when you last saw them.” Priest got up, wincing from the pain in his leg, he kept his hand on his thigh as he limped forwards.

“They’re taking Svlad.” Priest stopped when Pete held up a hand to tell him to do so.

“You want to see your boys again, don’t you?” Priest watched the conflict in Selena’s face as she stepped towards them only for Jacob to continue to lead her to the van. Amanda shot Pete again but still the man didn’t budge, just stood there and watched them as they climbed in the bus before taking off.

“Pete, ya let em get away.” Priest stated only for the man to turn around and look at him before glancing at his leg.

“Between both of us having a bug on the boy, I think he’ll be okay, Mr. Priest. Besides they will lead us right back to their hide out and we can see how many projects they themselves have collected.” Pete moved and slapped him on shoulder while walking passed. “Come along now, we should get your leg taken care of.” Priest grunted while glancing down at his thigh, limping after the man and towards the SUV where he could see there was an obvious scuffle from the way the snow was kicked up in the area.

“What did you do with the wonder twins?” Priest asked in amusement, Pete shot him a look over his shoulder of pure amusement while looking back ahead.

“Don’t worry, they’re taking a nap.” Pete shrugged while unlocking the SUV and getting in. Priest watched and hoisted himself up into the SUV wincing from the pain in his leg. “Bullet go all the way through?”

“Nope.” Pete sighed and Priest found himself annoyed when the man actually started to drive towards where he had seen the hospital when they were wandering around town. “I can just remove the bullet and take care of it—”

“I’m sure you could, Mr. Priest, but I want them to think he’s safe with them.”

\---

“You guys have to let me go back.” Svlad was shaking from his spot on the floor as he looked towards Cross who was driving and Gripps who was watching the emergency exit door on the side while Selena sat in back blocking that exit. He was trembling with fear as Martin looked him over trying to get him to sit on a seat but he refused to move.

“We are _not_ giving you back to them, Dirk.” Svlad covered his ears from the name and shook his head, crying and shaking whispering; ‘Dirk’s dead’ repeatedly while hugging his head to his knees.

“We need to check him to make sure they’re not tracking him.” Martin said, Svlad slowly looked up to the man from the words. Hand moving to his thigh as he turned his body away from him while shaking his head. If they touched it, it would shock him. The device would think he was trying to remove it. He shook his head with pleading tear-filled eyes while pressing himself tightly against the wall of the bus. “Cross, pull over.”

“No, no, no, no, no, no, no, please, no.” Svlad begged hugging his legs to his chest as the bus eventually came to a stop in a dark alleyway, he tried to pull away when Martin grabbed his arm but the man was a lot stronger than him as he pulled him up.

“Somethin on him don’t smell right.” Svlad tried to pull away as Jacob got closer.

“Smells like that thing.” Vogel stated while Martin motioned him back, Amanda moved closer this time and rested a hand on his shoulder. It was a feeling of comfort of familiarity, he looked to her and moved, hugging her. Clinging to her as he pressed his face in the crook of her neck, crying as he felt Martin touch the back of his neck where the barcode was.

“Can you guys… help him?” He knew what she meant by that and he tried to pull away only for the four vampires to begin feeding off him. Draining away his sorrow and stress and leaving him in this empty numb shell which now just stood there slowly letting go of Amanda. He didn’t say anything as he looked between them with a blank vacant stare. A feeling of numbness he began to become comfortable with when he shut down and no longer wanted to feel anything.

He could feel them checking his neck around the barcode, hear someone yelp he glanced over his shoulder and saw Vogel’s finger was bleeding. There was a sensation of something tickling the back of his skull but after more prodding nothing happened, so they moved on. Apologizing to him as they removed his jacket and shirt, he could hear the gasp and feeling of fingers touching the parts of his wings that were visible through the tank top. He could see Amanda’s anger as she moved and looked at it, eventually the tank top came off as they looked him over for where the bug would be.

“I’m going to kill him.” He could hear Amanda saying as she touched his back, he shivered from the touch and tried to pull away.

“You can’t.” Svlad looked at her over his shoulder tears in his eyes again. “Please don’t kill him, he’s not that bad—”

“Not that ba—Dirk, he _killed_ my Brother and Farah!” Svlad looked at her and moved to hug himself, getting cold from being half naked and standing there in the middle of the bus. “He kidnapped you and carved you up, he is forcing you to use your dead name!” Listing all the reasons he should hate Priest, but he didn’t, he didn’t hate him for that because he understood now. He saw the reason for the actions, he saw the bigger picture.

“He cut off loose ends and opened my eyes to the universe.” He said it coldly, pulling away from them while moving his hand to his pants, unbuttoning them while staring at Amanda’s shocked face from his words. “My name is Svlad Cjelli, and I am an Agent of Blackwing.” He showed the device on his leg, but he could see Amanda looking to the names that were cross out on his thighs instead. “And I need to get back to Mr. Priest and finish my case.” Amanda had tears in her eyes that were falling as she moved to touch Todd’s name before she looked to Farah’s and the device on his thigh.

“We need to remove that?” She asked while looking to Martin, sniffling as her voice cracked from the tears.

“Yeah… Drummer, we gotta get rid of that.” Svlad tried to tug his pants back up that time only for Gripps to catch him and wrap his arms around him as Martin moved to touch the device. He tensed while looking at it shaking his head.

“No don’t—” He screamed from the shock that coursed through him from the tug on the device, watching Martin pull away from it when the electric charge happened. Svlad flailed and kicked his legs until the shock stopped and Gripps slowly lowered him. “You… you need… You need the controller to… to remove it.” He slurred from his spot on the seat Gripps set him down on.

“Think we can eat the energy while we pull it out of him?” Gripps asked as Martin looked the device over.

“Even then it’s really deep in his leg we might do more damage than we realize.” Martin growled the words and Svlad moved to cover his face as he cried into his hands, leg twitching from the current that felt like it was lingering in his muscles. Amanda yelled out in anger and he could hear things being thrown around as she got out of the bus, yelling into the night air.

“We can’t get it out?’ Vogel asked from where he stood as Svlad moved to pull his pants back up.

“Not without that remote… can’t find the thing that don’t smell right on him either.” Svlad curled up on the seat and stared at the back of it, just waiting for them to leave him alone, only for a blanket to be placed over him. He glanced up to see Selena giving him a soft smile, he stared at her for a moment before pulling the blanket tightly around himself. Trying to block out the noise around him as they spoke about him like he wasn’t even there. Still curious what it was that hurt Jacob as he rubbed the back of his neck where he felt that weird itch again.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's a rough day for everyone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CHARACTERS: Svlad Cjelli. Rowdy 3 (Martin, Cross, Gripps, Vogel, Beast). Amanda Brotzman. Todd Brotzman. Farah Black. Thomas. Theodore. Selena. Pete Cook. Cosima.  
WARNINGS: Abuse mention. Murder Mention. Angsty stuff. Fight Scene. POV Change.  
NOTE: There's a LOT HAPPENING I'M SORRY

Svlad wasn’t sure what to do as the Rowdy 3 continued to drive around not staying in one place too long, which seemed silly to him. Sure, Priest would want to get him back, but he was injured, and they would need to take care of his wound. He knew the man would power through injuries a lot, but a gunshot wound to the leg really wasn’t something you could _ignore_. He actually smiled to himself realizing that this was definitely still something the man would ignore. He was probably making a big deal about how he was fine and could take care of the injury himself.

He let thoughts like that linger with him to make himself feel better as they continued moving around from place to place in an attempt to keep them all off the radar. Svlad slowly touched his thigh, feeling the device there as everyone tried to plan things around him.

“We have to figure out how to get Thomas and Theodore away from that thing. We also need to make a final decision on what we’re doin with Oz.” Svlad turned to look towards the voices from that panic in his chest as he heard Amanda give a heavy sigh.

“I don’t know. I want to kill him, I think he more than deserves to die.” Svlad had begun chewing on his thumbnail before slowly sitting up to look between them, hugging himself while glancing towards the back of the bus that currently was unguarded. “But I couldn’t do it.” Defeat in her voice he could hear her moving the gun and he just listened.

“Nothin’ wrong with not bein able to take a life, Drummer.” He could get out… He glanced back at them as they spoke amongst one another. He watched their back and forth before getting up, slowly making his way towards the back of the bus only to be grabbed by Amanda who pulled him back and away from the door.

“Dirk, you can’t-” He smacked her hand away while looking at her, feeling shocked with himself from actually hitting her. He looked at his own hands before looking back up at her as she stood there silently, stepping forwards to put her hands on his shoulders. “We are going to save you.”

“I don’t need saving!” He pulled away and made a run for the door, Amanda was faster though, she caught him and pulled him close, arms wrapped tightly around him as Svlad’s fingers brushed the handle to the emergency exit door. So close to freedom, so close to being back with Priest, only to be pulled away and shoved back down into one of the seats.

“You are not going back to him!”

“I belong to him!” Svlad shouted back while running his hands through his hair, trying to calm down. “I don’t belong to you. I belong to Blackwing.” He felt her hands on his knees and slowly looked back to her as she sniffled and knelt down in front of him. Looking him in the face as she took in a shaky breath.

“I had a vision of you. You’re in danger with them.” She squeezed his knees. “You have to believe me, Dirk.”

“Svlad.” He corrected, watching how she stared up at him and sat back on her calves. Silence between them as she slowly dropped her gaze, like she was trying to look at his scars through his pants.

“I saw you, in my vision. A lot of them go by really fast in quick flashes but this one… this one was crystal clear, you were on your knees, with a blank expression and glowing eyes… like how Noah was.” She said it calmly, Svlad looked to her while narrowing his eyes.

“But Aodhan took care of Noah, he’s gone.”

“That’s the thing… I don’t know if he actually is gone.” He looked at her and arched a brow as Amanda shifted looking glad that he was humoring her with this conversation. “Aodhan destroyed his body, sure, but if you remember when he took us into his mind…” She trailed off and Svlad looked at her for a while feeling a sudden wave of exhaustion washed over him as he turned away from her and scooted as far over in the seat as possible to press against the window.

“You’re saying I made the wrong choice.” He said it finally after a moment, and Amanda moved and sat down next to him.

“I don’t know, Dirk-”

“Svlad.”

“I don’t know, okay, I felt like the door needed to be opened but I couldn’t open it. I feel like if we opened it, we could have gotten Noah’s mind out and shut the door on whatever else was in there. Like we could have saved him, I don’t know what killing him did, but I had a vision and whatever had Noah had you.” He frowned wondering how that could even happen.

“Amanda…” She perked up from him actually trying to interact as he turned his head to look at her. “How did you find me?” Amanda looked from him towards Martin and back again.

“Originally a contact we had told us you were heading to Montana… when we got here, I had a vision about that place, then we just ended up there at the right time to grab you I guess.” Svlad stared at her for a moment and arched a brow.

“Contact?” She looked at him with a look that already said she said too much. He took the hint and dropped eye contact while staring out towards the rest of the Rowdies. Remembering Scott, how he was working with someone inside Blackwing keeping an eye on the projects. Was the same “rat” telling them where projects were so they could continue to collect them. “How many projects have you guys collected?” He finally asked and Martin cleared his throat from the front getting their attention.

“We need to set up for the night. I don’t know when Oz and Pete will show up. We’ll take shifts for watch, I’ll take it first.” Martin stated while pulling over, shutting the bus off as Vogel happily jumped out to start up the generator they had attached to keep the inside of the bus warm while it was off. “How you doin’ beauty boy?” Martin asked while crouching down next to the seat. Svlad looked between all of them before sighing and looking out the window.

“I would like to go back to Mr. Priest.” Was all he said, even though he was feeling exhausted, Martin got up and leaned over the seat to ruffle his hair. Not saying anything just checking on everyone else in the bus. Setting up who would take first watch with him and who would be next. Svlad eventually ended up curled up in that blanket where the rest of the rowdies slept. The exhaustion and stress of everything catching up as he fell asleep, actually enjoying the warmth of being surrounded by multiple bodies. Selena snuggling him on one side, Amanda on the other as Vogel practically laid on top of them.

It was oddly very comforting and helped him quickly doze off.

This white space was different than what he was used to. Instead of the house the Rowdies found him in, it was once more that pure white room. The Phonograph still playing only this time the song was different, it wasn’t one he recognized as the disc warped it beyond vocal comprehension. He looked up when he heard a noise come from behind him. It sounded close and familiar, telling him that his friend was behind him and closer than he had ever felt them before.

“Do you know what the thing inside of Noah was?” He was met with a silence that was beginning to make his skin crawl. “Is it still alive?” He asked there was a silence as the disk jumped and skipped on the phonograph.

“I told you, Svlad, I know many things.” The voice sounded closer than it had ever been before, like his friend was right behind him. Svlad kept staring at the phonograph, watching it turn and weave in the broken player which was rotting away before his very eyes. He slowly turned his head to see the shadow mimicking him, backs to one another and head turned just like his was to glance over their shoulder at him.

“You’re not really my friend, are you?” He finally asked, he hated that he couldn’t get a read off them as the shadow stared at him. He couldn’t see their eyes, but he could feel them, the silence felt like enough of an answer he could see the shadows shoulders shaking as Svlad turned all the way around to face them. The shadow turned with and he watched as they started to finally take form.

“I’m you.” The voice said and it sounded just like him, the dark shadow fading around the form, and sure enough there he stood face to face with someone that looked exactly like him… only his skin was a pale gray color, his eyes were pure black with red irises shining back at him. He wore all Black and had his hair gelled back, wearing clothes he would find himself in only… darker. He looked so professional. Like what he imagined himself to look like if he actually did accept being a Blackwing Agent.

“You…”

“Or rather,” He started, hands moving as the mirrored version of him adjusted leather gloves on his hands. “I’m you if you stopped resisting.” Svlad found himself confused as he rubbed his face, when he dropped his hands, he could see a gloved hand held out for him. Waiting patiently for him to shake it, but somehow it felt like a trap. There were mixed feelings swirling around deep in the pit of his stomach that left him more confused and unsure of anything. “All you have to do, is accept me.” He didn’t know if he was ready for that, not fully. “Let me in.”

“I—” He gasped when he felt a hand grab him by the shoulder, he could see the grayscale version of himself looking to the side with a flash of raw anger and could see Hugo in the reflection of his eyes. There was a twitch to his face that seemed out of place but before he could question it, he found himself being pulled away, he felt like he was free falling and came to consciousness with a jolt as he sat up. Panting and trying to catch his breath as he felt movement next to him.

“Smell that?” Svlad looked over as Martin got up from where he was sleeping next to him. Svlad could see the other rowdies that weren’t keeping watch waking as Martin stood up and banged his bat on the roof. “Time to move!”

\---

“Who shot you by the way?” Pete had informed them that they had to make a medical stop which went by surprisingly fast. Probably form them waving badges around and getting what they wanted… and now they were on the hunt for their physic buddy who was rescued by other Holistic people. He stopped tracking to the full extent of what was going on. “Just so I can like, thank them, you know.” Tommy asked with an amused smile from where he currently sat in the back seat with Theo, both of them tied up he could hear laughing and glanced over to Todd who had an almost proud smile on his face.

“My little sister.” Tommy gave a ‘HA’ while turning his head to look towards Priest.

“Shiiiiit, you got shot a chick, that’s fucking awesome, I’m gonna high five her when we meet. Which they have Svlad right?” Tommy asked with a smile, ignoring Farah and Todd when they both groaned from the name use.

“His names’ Dirk.” They kept saying that, but he didn’t know who to really listen to in this situation, guessed since Svlad… or Dirk, or what the fuck ever wasn’t here to have a panic attack he could humor the two dead people by saying the other name.

“I think you would like the whole gang of them.” Priest eventually stated, ignoring the comments with surprising ease. Tommy was a little disappointed, he hoped to get more of a reaction out of the older man who was playing on his phone… probably tracking Svlad, he sighed while leaning his head back, head turned to look at Theo who seemed deep in thought. He moved to elbow him and get his attention, seeing a look on Theo’s face he hadn’t for a long time.

“Hey… what’s wrong?” He asked in a whisper watching him for any tell signs of what was eating at him.

“Nothing.” Theo said with a forced smile, one that told Tommy that there was actually something wrong.

“I think I know where I am.” He flinched from the sudden voice and looked over to the girl who was now sitting right next to him, she didn’t look as opaque as normal which meant she was fading faster. He watched as she closed her eyes and leaned her head back. “I can hear machines, like construction machines.” He could see her beginning to fade out again, looking different than the other ghosts around which caused him to give a sigh of relief.

“Look, Abby, you need to hold on to that. Hold on to sounds, smells, anything about where you are the longer you don’t the more you keep fading into dead territory.” Talking to her in a whisper, because he didn’t want people to start thinking he cared or something… because he didn’t.

“I’m cold.” Her voice was fading out and he watched as her appearance flickered, he could feel the room getting colder and out of the corner of his eye he noticed Priest had stopped what he was doing and began to glance over at him.

“Getting cold in here, Tommy, Abby bringing you friends?” He was silent as he glanced through the faces of the dead that were in the vehicle with them. Looking to see who was out of place and wrong, he could feel the car getting exceptionally colder right next to him and Tommy closed his eyes tight, holding his breath. He didn’t want to look, he didn’t want to see it, just ignore it and it will go away. But he could feel the linger, his hair standing on end as a chill ran up his spine.

“None of your business.” Tommy snapped as he slowly opened his eyes, and he could feel the familiar presence sitting next to him even if he couldn’t see it.

_“You finally going to be useful, Tommy?_” The voice jeered in his head and everything else around it felt like white noise. “_You just have to end it._” He moved trying to free himself from the restraints and tune out the voice. “_I’m_. _Waiting_.”

“Can we turn up the music, please?” Tommy finally asked loudly, louder than he needed to but he could hear more voices over lapping the main one, whispering deep dark things to him that was making his skin crawl.

“Relax we’re coming up on them.” Pete stated coldly as he drove down an alley where what he would like to call a ‘death metal bus’. He could see the people inside and watched it slowly starting to lurch forwards, the chains on the tires getting it to move. Pete just kept going and rather roughly hit the back of it, aiming just right to get the bus to cock to the side from sliding in the snow, getting wedged against the buildings it was trying to slip between. Pete slowly put the vehicle in park and shut it off. About to open the door but Martin had appeared out of nowhere and kicked it back closed.

Growling at him through the closed window. Which was a short-lived experience as Tommy watched Priest aim a gun and open fire at the man who ducked and moved only to slam back into the door when Pete tried to open it again. Getting a small disappointed sigh from the man in the driver’s side, Tommy watched as Pete leaned his head out the window presumably to look at Martin who was keeping the door closed.

“Martin Priest, Incubus Number One… you prefer just Martin, right?” The name had Tommy doing a double take as he looked from Pete towards Priest in shock. “I’m really starting to see the resemblance between you and your brother now, because you’re both a pain in my ass.” Pete stated with a small laugh, Tommy found himself surprised as he glanced over to Priest who was opening his door and stepping out. Aiming his machine gun at two other men who had gotten out to try and push the SUV off the bus.

“You just tried to shoot your brother?! What the fuck is wrong with you!?” Tommy snapped in offense before looking over to Theo who managed to get out of his restraints. He could see a smile on Theo’s face and realized now that’s why he was being so quiet and mopey. Before he could say anything, Theo was already working on getting him untied, and their back door opened which must have been from Martin. Pete had finally made his move then.

He kicked open the door and Martin was sent stumbling forwards, catching himself before turning around to face Pete who stepped out of the car and dusted himself off. Everything felt like chaos as he heard Priest giggle while shooting at someone. He could hear glass shattering as he and Theodore got out of the car, Cross and Gripps were doing what they could to try and keep Priest under control. There was an older woman on the bus trying to get it out from where it was pinned.

Pete was now advancing on Martin only for a short brunette woman to jump out and swing a pipe at Pete who caught it with pretty quick reflexes. She tried to pull it out of his grasp, looking annoyed as Pete just started to laugh. It was unnerving and Tommy found himself watching as Martin moved to pull the woman away from Pete who yanked the pipe out of her hand and grabbed her by the throat. She was screaming like she was in agony until Pete lifted her up off the floor where she couldn’t get any sound out from easily being strangled by her own body weight against his hand. There was a large smile on his face and Tommy could see both Farah and Todd trying desperately to help her even though they couldn’t do anything.

“Drummer!” Martin immediately started hitting the man in the arm right at the joint of his forearm and elbow. Hitting him repeatedly trying to make him let go getting more and more violent and quicker with each swing. “Let. Her. Go.” Growling the words at him as Amanda struggled very clearly not being able to breathe from how Pete was holding her.

Tommy looked to Theo watching him pace back and forth with uncertainty, and Tommy found himself frozen. He could run, he could grab Theo and run, they could get to safety, to hell with all these people. Svlad had gotten out of the bus now getting between the guys who were fighting Priest, and Priest. Trying to get them to stop, begging as they all tried to make Svlad stand down and move out of the way. He turned about to grab Theo when a loud crash resounded through the alleyway.

“Way to not invite me.” A new voice pierced the air along with the sound of singing crystals. Tommy turned to look over his shoulder at a woman who stood there. The snow around her looked like it had been blown away leaving a perfect circled of it around her. She held a coffee cup in her hand which she sipped out of while looking between everyone, bundled up in a warm jacket, a scarf, and a beanie which did nothing to hide her long and crimson dyed hair.

“Could use your help here, hotshot!” Martin called out to her, she just sighed but moved forwards, running towards Pete as she threw her coffee and kicked off the ground into the air. There were handprints that appeared in the snow as she soared up and landed down right where Pete’s arm used to be. The man having thrown Amanda backwards and jumped out of the way to avoid the collision. Amanda was coughing and gasping as Martin grabbed her and pulled her away, a blue light coming off her as he got her into the bus.

“You guys found the new Diamond.” Pete sounded pleased, glancing around at everything that was happening with a large smile. “Wow, this is…” He looked so impressed while looking her over. “I’m shivering this is exciting, they don’t have _anything_ on Diamond other than she was dangerous. So dangerous she had to be put down, wasn’t that the words you used, Priest?” He rubbed his hands together while pulling out his notebook.

“Kinda busy, Pete.” Priest snapped back and Tommy flinched from the sound of electricity and glanced over to see Priest digging a baton into Cross’ side, electrocuting him before having to jump back and dodge the sledgehammer that was aiming for him. Slipping on the ice from his injured leg and almost losing footing only to catch himself on the SUV. Which he pushed off of and went right back to it, Tommy could see the pain and exhaustion was getting to him. He should be taken down soon…

“What’s your name Doll?” Pete continued.

“Call me Doll again and I’ll cut your head off, four eyes.” She stated boredly, there was the sound of singing crystals and Tommy watched as the SUV moved, being shoved backwards by some sort of invisible force.

“Incredible, telekinesis?” Pete asked stepping closer to her. She was glaring at him while stepping back, Tommy found himself uncomfortable with what was going on watching as the man reached out to grab for her. There was the sound of ringing crystals again and Pete pulled back to look at his hand which had a giant gash on it.

“Don’t touch me, dude.” She said calmly as the Bus started to move. “Who all we takin?”

“Technically everyone but that thing is one of us.” Martin said in a growl, Tommy found himself looking towards Priest before he looked to Theo who ran over to where they were.

“Theo!” He said it in a rushed whisper not wanting to give away what his brother was doing. He could see Priest turning his head from the sound of him running at him, there was a moment he saw the gun move and he covered his eyes not able to look as he crouched down and hugged his head. Covering his ears and closing his eyes. He flinched when the sound of a gun shot reverberated through the air but just one… He slowly, very slowly moved to look.

Afraid of what he would find.

Thankfully, all he saw was Theo holding Priest in a sleeper hold the man down on one knee as Theo dug his heel into his calf to keep him down. Cross was holding the machine gun away and Vogel was jumping around them as Gripps held a fighting Svlad back. He looked from them over to Pete who finally turned his attention away from the girl to take in the scene around him.

“Isn’t this a turn of events.” Pete hummed while closing his notebook, slipping it away and Tommy slowly moved to where Theo was, watching him choke Priest out as Martin got out of the bus after getting Amanda safely inside.

“Boys.” He called out and Tommy watched as the ones helping Theo with Svlad and Priest looked towards him. “Load up.” There was a loud crash and Tommy watched as the SUV now had the font of it completely crushed, the newer addition to the group continued to stand between Pete and them.

Like a guard.

“What are we doing about him?” Tommy could see Priest was barely staying awake in Theo’s arms, he was sure trying though. And Theo looked to be in pain from Priest working on fighting him and trying to break out of the hold. Martin paced looking like he was trying to think as the new girl held Pete back. He could see every time the man tried to move forwards something would keep him back. Looking like there was an invisible force holding him as he walked forwards into it. Fighting whatever it was and even pushing their guard backwards.

“Guys! I can’t hold this thing forever!” She shouted and Martin gave a frustrated growl before moving forwards and hitting Priest hard enough he knocked him out. Watching as Theo dropped Osmund in surprised in the snow, Svlad continued to try and fight to get out of Gripps hold and go to him as Martin hesitated before finally motioning to the bus.

“He’s a tool of the universe too.” He said it in an annoyed tone and Theo just dragged the man through the snow, towards the Bus, the man who had his machine gun helping to load him in. Tommy hesitated but joined them, watching as Martin set to work at both chaining up and gagging Priest before climbing to the front. Telling the woman at the helm to go as their nameless protector walked backwards after the bus leaving a grinning Pete behind before her body lifted up off the floor and looked to be yanked backwards into the bus. The emergency exit door slamming shut as she took in a deep breath and shook her hands off like she touched something gross.

“I don’t like whoever he is. He’s fucking gross.” She stated while crossing her arms. “And now I lost my coffee, like seriously, guys, why didn’t you come back to me? I could have helped out much earlier.”

“You said you didn’t want to help us unless we paid you.” Tommy looked between them as he slowly sat down in a seat, watching as Svlad moved to Priest and sat with him. He looked surprisingly peaceful in his sleep.

“Who are you guys?” Tommy finally asked as Theo looked to be staring at the older woman who looked vaguely familiar, he could see tears in her eyes, and then when he looked up at Theo, he could see tears in his. They were silent as Theo moved forwards and hugged the woman who held him tightly, both crying leaving Tommy feeling unsure. Theo moved to motion him over and Tommy slowly got up to head over. His brother grabbing him by the shirt and pulling him in to the hug as Selena held both of them.

“My beautiful boys.” Tommy took a moment to register the words as she kissed both of their heads. This was their mother. The only time he had ever seen her was when he was too young to remember. He didn’t feel as strongly as Theo did as the woman hugged and loved on them from all the missed years. He wondered if he was heartless for not feeling anything like Theo did. “Look how grown you are.” She leaned back to take in both of their appearances.

“They told us you were dead.” Theo finally stated, and Tommy wondered if that’s why he didn’t feel anything for her.

“They told me the same thing about both of you. But I knew in my heart you were both still around. I tried to find you, I swear I did.” Tommy’s gaze dropped as he looked from his apparent mother and brother towards the rest of the bus’s inhabitants.

“Will someone tell me what the fuck is going on?” Tommy finally asked and they all looked at him. He stepped back from Selena as he motioned around. “I mean really, I thought I was here to solve some case for Svlady boy over there and now we are on a bus with a shit ton of people we don’t know. Theo, I know you’re used to this type of shit, the whole ‘oh let’s follow the universe’ but I’m not so like… What. The. Fuck!?”

“I’m Martin.” He looked towards Priest’s apparent brother and stared at him for a moment. “That’s Beast.” Tommy flinched when a very brightly colored woman popped up from behind a seat and giggled while waving. “Cosima.” The newest addition to the fold waving as she flopped down in a seat and began to play on her phone. “Drummer… or Amanda.” Motioning to the brunette who had been strangled by Pete, who currently sat in Vogel’s lap as he checked on her to make sure she was okay. “Vogel.” He waved at them. “Cross.”

“Yo!”

“And Gripps.”

“Welcome aboard!”

“And Selena, who y’all apparently know.” Martin motioned to the woman with Theo. “Welcome to the Rowdy 3.” Tommy looked from Gripps to the rest of the group before motioning around them.

“Rowdy Three… There’s… eight of you…”

“Ugh, my head hurts too much for math.” He glanced to the girl in Vogel’s lap as she sat up and rubbed her throat which already looked badly bruised.

“How man more have you found?” Svlad finally asked and Tommy slowly looked back towards him then towards Martin who looked back with a shrug.

“We were hoping to have more, you guys took Aodhan, and Mona. And I’m kind of afraid to ask who else.” Martin stated, Tommy looked to Todd and Farah, watching Farah kneel next to Amanda, looking so miserable that she couldn’t do anything. Todd was pacing looking like he was torn of who to go to, if he should go to Amanda or Svlad.

“Hey boss.” He looked back to Vogel and Amanda, the boy smiling as he stared down at her. “See anything fun?” She sighed and rubbed her face before flopping back against Vogel.

“It all happened really fast…”

“What about your attack? You have been weaponizing them, but you didn’t with that one.” Martin stated while looking back to her, she shuddered from the question and looked away. Tommy could see her hands were shaking as she thought about whatever her apparent attack was.

“I don’t want to talk about it.”


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> CHARACTERS: Osmund Priest. Svlad Cjelli. Amanda Brotzman. Rowdy 3 (Martin, Gripps, Cross, Vogel). Tommy and Theo. Selena. Cosima. Pete. Abigail. Hugh.  
WARNINGS: POV Change... idk a lot. and yet not that much? Angst I guess. Priest Brother's bs.  
NOTE: I love Hugh, idk if anyone has seen my art of Hugh I did a long ass time ago, but like.. I love him.

Priest stared at the phonograph, watching it as it slowly tried to play the song which had a blues vibe to it. Melancholy and sad with little strums and woeful lyrics. He watched as it stopped mid beat before coming out even more distorted as it worked on picking up speed again. He glanced around and could see a hallway with the Red Door at the end. There wasn’t smoke coming out of the broken corner anymore, but he swore he could see an eye staring back at him. Like someone was peeking through the crack, he could see it vanish into the darkness and found the hair on the back of his neck standing on end. He looked away when he heard noise from deeper in the white space.

“You Svlad’s friend?” He finally asked hand moving to rub his jaw which was aching, but he felt like he wasn’t doing anything to it. There was silence that followed, and Priest slowly moved through the white space trying to place where the sound had come from.

“You are not supposed to be here.” Priest arched a brow while looking up when he heard the voice above him, he could see a shadow like there was a doorway somehow about a floor over him. He stepped back a few times to look to the shadow that pulled itself around the corner.

“Thought you were supposed to know everything.”

“I said you weren’t supposed to be here not that I didn’t know you were coming.” The voice snapped back causing Priest to arch a brow in amusement.

“Not a lot of manners, snapping back like that, hiding away from your guests. Svlad made it seem like you were friendly.” He watched as a silhouette peered around the corned and stared down at him, he could feel the weight of the shadow staring down at him that didn’t help with the weird feeling. “Don’t come off friendly.” He taunted.

“You are not supposed to be here.”

“Who are you? And what exactly do you want from Svlad?” He watched the form shake as a laugh began to fill the area.

“Nothing… I am Svlad.” Priest arched a brow watching the shadow melt away and sure enough he found himself staring up at the greyscaled version of Svlad. He stared at him for a moment, eyes narrowing as he looked the figure over not sure how he felt about this. “You aren’t supposed to be here, because here.” He watched him motion around. “Is my subconscious, not yours.” Priest watched as the room they stood in began to form in detail, it first started to look like the house they found Jacob in but then it shifted.

“If it was Svlad’s I feel like you would be nicer to me.” Playful tone as the very room they stood in changed before his eyes till he stood level to level with Svlad in what looked like a hall in Blackwing, the one right outside of Svlad’s room. He looked around before looking back to the man in front of him who looked so prim and proper and nothing how Svlad usually looked.

He didn’t trust it.

“Being the subconscious, I’m the part he’s suppressing, meaning all the hate and anger towards you. Now get out.” The room shook and his voice almost boomed, he stepped closer to Svlad, clicking his teeth as he glared down at him.

“You’re lying.” He could see a twitch on its face right by its eye. He didn’t trust for a second this was Svlad, it didn’t feel right. He got the same feeling from this thing as he did from Pete. “Why does his subconscious have the red door?” He asked waiting for whatever the thing was going to say before he just smiled up at him.

“Isn’t it obvious, Mr. Priest? We’re all connected to it, I’m the closest, that’s why Noah needed me to open the door for him.”

“Noah’s still alive, at least the thing inside of Noah is, you know that?” He asked while stepping closer, watching the thing that looked like Svlad take a step back. “Starting to get my own theory on what ya really are.”

“That’s great, Mr. Priest, maybe we can discuss it one day—”

“Pete said that thing’s consciousness is still alive, it’s body stuck behind the red door, so when Aodhan tried to kill what was inside of Noah all it did was destroy Noah.” He watched the way Svlad’s eyes turned pure black hiding any indication of eye reactions from him. “You’re it, ain’t ya? You’re whatever took over Noah.” He took another step and he could hear the floor under his foot crack like glass causing him to stop. He looked down at his feet to see the floor breaking away into shards before he looked back up to Svlad who held a look of annoyance on his face.

“You have been here far too long, good luck with the family reunion.” He arched a brow at him before the ground under him broke away, he could feel himself falling and quickly jolted awake.

Everything felt bright as Priest slowly began to open his eyes, wincing from the pain in both his leg and his head as he tried to take in the sights around him. The first thing he saw was Svlad and from the position he was in he deduced he was on the floor in the boy’s lap. His jaw ached so he tried to move it, biting down on the cloth in his mouth only to choke himself on his own drool. He coughed and moved to try to sit up, he could see Svlad looking surprised then happy from the movement, but he didn’t get far when brother dearest decided to sit on his stomach and shove him back down with the end of his bat digging into his sternum.

“You’re staying right there, Oz.” Priest grinned as he glared up at him his arms and hands were tingling with a pins and needles feeling and he shifted trying to figure out how he was restrained. The chains were a bit of a disappointment as those would be harder to break out of. “We’re deciding what to do with you.” Martin informed him, and Priest arched a brow before glancing at the rest of the bus’s occupants.

“I say we throw him out the back of the bus.” He looked to Amanda who was glaring at him before he looked up to Svlad when he heard a soft; “no” come from the boy’s lips.

“You can’t do that.” Svlad continued and Priest couldn’t stop himself from laughing nudging his shoulder into Svlad’s thigh he could see the boy look down at him. His hands were moving to follow the wordless command to get the gag out of his mouth. He didn’t get far before Gripps grabbed Svlad and pulled him away causing Priest to slide off the boy’s lap and hit the cold floor of the bus.

“He doesn’t get to talk.” Was all Martin said while looking over to Svlad who tried to get away from Gripps. “Here’s how this is going to go, Oz. You’re going to remain chained up and gagged until we figure out what to do with you.” Priest ran his tongue along the gag before shrugging his shoulders, giving Martin a smug smile as he watched him get up. He could feel the man grab his bicep and without a word yanked him up and dragged him to the back of the bus where he secured his chains to the metal frame of one of the seats. “Dirk should be kept away from him at all times.”

“That’s not my name! And you can’t do that! Let me go!” Priest watched Svlad fight as he moved to try and assess how the chains were secured, seeing the locks that held them into place he sighed while shifting to get comfortable. Watching Svlad tire himself out before being guided to sit down with Amanda and Jacob. He would get out of this, either by himself or from Pete showing up due to the fact that man did plant bugs on himself and Svlad.

\---

“Hey, Svlad.” Svlad hated everything about this, he flinched when he saw Tommy get into the seat in front of him, turned around so he was facing him. “I think I know where Abigail is.” That… well that was good news, he moved to wipe some tears from his eyes before taking in a deep breath giving him his full attention.

“Where?”

“There’s this spot that’s full of old condemned houses. I tend to avoid it because… well they’re condemned for a reason… But they recently have been tearing down old houses and putting new ones up to try and renovate the area, hoping to make this place seem nice for new people.” Svlad watched as Tommy crossed his arms while leaning over the back of the seat. “The last thing Abigail said was that she could hear construction. That’s the only area they’ve had active work going here.”

“Looks like that’s where we’re headed, you know the place?” Martin had asked while leading Tommy to the front. Svlad watched as Martin had Selena pull over and then took over driving them to wherever Tommy was leading them. Svlad watched them before turning to look towards Priest, he could see the man slowly working on feeling along the chains that held him. He found himself wanting to go to him, to help him and do everything he could to get him out of this. He looked to Amanda when he felt her hand on his shoulder.

“He’s poison.” Was all she said, and he wanted to defend him, instead he just let tears well up in his eyes. Trying to think of what to do, of how to save him. He didn’t feel skilled enough to do it, he needed to be different, he needed to—

Be an agent…

“I’m tired.” He said while looking towards Amanda, watching her shift slightly before nodding her head.

“Oh okay, we can set up a makeshift bed again.” He could hear chains clanking from that, he turned to look at Priest who shook his head. He arched a brow from that before looking to Amanda when she got between them. But he wanted to know why Priest didn’t want him to sleep, he slowly dropped his gaze, picking at his nails before looking back to Amanda.

“Please, Amanda, can I speak to him?” He asked in a soft voice, he could see her become tense, but he didn’t want to look at her. He could already picture the anger, the disappointment, the hurt on her face. He didn’t want to see it, he just stood there silently, his thoughts of even trying to sleep being disrupted when he felt a hand on his shoulder. He turned his head to look to Tommy who was pointing out the windows towards what Svlad would consider a ghost town.

“Your girl is there somewhere.” He could feel a pull and began to walk towards the door which Martin opened for him.

“Are you coming?” He stopped on the step to look back towards Tommy who was hugging himself and staring out towards the neighborhood.

“I don’t think it’s a good idea… besides someone should stay with the bus, right?” He asked with a small laugh, Svlad watched as Theo grabbed Tommy’s shoulder and basically dragged him and Svlad both out of the bus. Amanda and Vogel followed behind along with Gripps, the six of them heading down the snow-covered streets.

“Where to?” Theo asked while looking around, Svlad furrowed his brows as he tried to find that feeling. He swore he could hear the slow whine of the old phonograph. He closed his eyes and slowly headed that way.

“This way.”

\---

Priest watched them for as long as he could before he went back to work on trying to get out of his restraints, he could see Martin staring out towards where they came from obviously on the lookout for Pete. Cosima was outside and Priest wasn’t entirely sure what she was up to.

“There’s a lot about you I learned to understand.” Priest slowly looked over to Martin when the man walked over and crouched down in front of him. “I don’t understand how you can work with that thing though.” Priest stretched his jaw when Martin pulled the gag out of his mouth. Turning his head to the side he wiped some of his drool off on his own shoulder and shrugged.

“Not like I enjoy working with him.” Okay… well that wasn’t entirely true, there were aspects he did and enjoy and hated that he enjoyed. “What do you see when you look at him? I’ve leaned everyone else sees something different.” Priest leaned forwards with an amused smile as Martin scanned his eyes obviously trying to get a read from him.

“It’s a smell, and we can feel the energy coming off of it. It’s too much for one person to have, normal, or like us.” Martin explained while standing up. “What you’re doing to that boy ain’t right.” He rolled his eyes from the new direction he was taking the conversation to.

“I’m a bad man, Marty, you know that.” Martin just lit a cigarette and had a look of disdain on his face, Selena leaned against the seat she was sitting on watching them.

“He feels sad.” They both looked over to her as she looked to her hands. “Not the boy, he seems content.” She informed and Priest gave Martin a large grin from that one. “But the beast that wears someone else’s face. He feels sad.”

“Trust me when I say that thing has more joy than anyone I have ever met.” Priest stated while tugging at the chains, moving a foot to kick Martin in the thigh. “You don’t want me here anymore than I want to be here, let me and Svlad go—”

“You’re not taking him.”

“Fuck, Martin, I need to get him out of his head that thing that was inside of Noah is haunting his dreams. I have to get him to a place where he doesn’t want to sleep and go to it. Now unchain me.” Martin stared down at him and took in a deep drag, crouching down again before blowing smoke in his face. Priest grunted while looking away till the smoke dissipated before looking back to him.

“I am not letting you take him. You’ve done more than enough to that kid.”

“Look, Marty, you know me.” He leaned forwards, his eyes scanned Martin’s through his glasses. “You know what I’m capable of doing.” He watched Martin bring the cigarette to his lips with a look of annoyance on his face. “You can unchain me now, or I will get out of this, and make sure you regret not just letting me go.” Martin took in a deep breath and slowly stood up while looking him over.

“I have half a mind to just kill you.” Priest watched as Martin pulled out his hand gun that Amanda had stolen, watching him as he unloaded the clip and looked at it before sliding it back in. Cocking the gun before looking it over and aiming it at him. Priest stared down the barrel for a moment before arching a brow and looking up at him.

“We all know you ain’t got the heart for it.” Martin slowly lowered the gun to his side and shrugged his shoulders.

“And that don’t bother me one bit, I take pride in being absolutely nothing like you.” He watched Martin unload the gun before walking away. Priest gave an annoyed sigh, glancing at the door when he saw Cosima poke her head in.

“He found us.” Priest turned to look and could see Pete standing outside, a vague outline of a white SUV in the distance, the only thing visible being the black tinted windows.

“Of course, he found us, he did bug both me and Svlad.” Priest stated boredly, watching how the man just stood outside not really looking like he was trying anything.

\---

Svlad pushed open the door of a house that had lights on, he glanced around and covered his mouth from the smell of rot and death as he slowly walked deeper into the home. He could hear the rest of his companions behind him before Tommy took the lead, heading forwards they all followed him into the house and up the stairs. Tommy opened a door and Svlad gasped when he saw the girl from the missing posters laying in a bed. She had blankets pulled up to her shoulders and looked to be sleeping soundly, Tommy headed over to her and Svlad glanced around noticing pictures on the wall of that same distorted figure.

“Abigail?” He looked back to Tommy who was checking for her pulse. “Jesus, she’s burning up.” He moved to slowly pull the blanket off her and they could see a wound on her arm that looked infected. Horribly infected and Svlad could smell the rot from the wound of where he was. He moved his hands to cover his mouth and nose while staring at it. “That’s not good…”

“Come on, we have to get her to a hospital.” Theo moved and picked her up, carrying her bridal style she reacted with a whine which was good. That meant she wasn’t too far gone, they all turned and headed for the door starting down the stairs and stopping when they saw a person near the door. Slowly closing it as they stared up at the group.

“Where are you taking Abby?” Svlad could see cuts on their cheek, but everything about the wounds looked dried and old, their eyes were dark and skin was a pale gray that almost looked dead. Svlad honestly wasn’t sure how to respond to the person who blocked their exit either intentionally or unintentionally.

“Hugh?” Tommy had asked and Svlad looked over his shoulder at him as Amanda took an almost protective stance at the front. “You’re Hugh…” Tommy stepped down the stairs and moved grabbing the man by the front of his shirt pulling him away from the door. Hugh didn’t do anything to defend himself just stood there with a look of confusion on his face. “You’re like that other… thing… How did you get this? I knew her.” Svlad watched as Tommy shook Hugh only to look to the side in confusion. “What do you mean you gave it to him!?”

“She wasn’t using it anymore…” Svlad ran his hand through his hair, trying to understand what was happening.

“Wasn’t using what?” Amanda thankfully blurted out his question for him. Hugh slowly looked back at them and smiled while motioning to himself.

“The body.”


End file.
